If only I had a tool to...?

[theArchitect]

Hey guys,

I'm hoping you will be able to give me some help... I'm a computer science student and armature photographer. Next term I have a fairly substantial software development project and thought I'd create some software for photographers.

I've got a couple of ideas but before I suggest anything, I would really appreciate any ideas you have regarding:

• boring/complex/repetitive tasks that could be made easier
• something you'd like to do to your photos but don't have to tools to - could be some sort of tagging/editing/uploading/resizing/...
• existing software that has limited functionality and could be extended
• any interaction you'd like between photos on: your computer/Flickr/Facebook/Twitter/...
• anything that could improve your work-flow from camera -> computer -> upload -> print

I have around 25-30 weeks to plan, build and write a report so I'm not out to write the next Photoshop; equally a water-marking plugin probably wouldn't be substantial enough on it's own.

I know this sounds a bit spammy but I would genuinely appreciate any ideas or suggestions.

Many thanks

[JerInTheBox]

Well it bugs the crap outta me that I can't just hit the left and right arrows to cycle through pictures on Flickr the way you can on Picassa, Facebook, or lots of other image sites. Maybe you could write a Greasemonkey script for that. It probably wouldn't take you a whole term to do, but it'd still be appreciated.

[candleman]

Originally Posted by JerInTheBox

Well it bugs the crap outta me that I can't just hit the left and right arrows to cycle through pictures on Flickr the way you can on Picassa, Facebook, or lots of other image sites. Maybe you could write a Greasemonkey script for that. It probably wouldn't take you a whole term to do, but it'd still be appreciated.

apparently that exists.
Handy Flickr add-ons/plug-ins/scripts/etc

[JerInTheBox]

Not really, I mean on every photo page. The Gallery Plus sort does that but I want to be able to jump from photo page to photo page, not just cycle through the images, there are lots of plugins that can do that.

[OsmosisStudios]

EyeFi has almost got me sold on their product. Essentially, its an SD card that connects wirelessly to a network or laptop. The problem is that it will only transfer JPGs.

I know there are setups one can use for pro-studio systems that transfer the files over wirelessly, but theyre horrendously expensive and usually Bluetooth based.

It might be outside the scope of your project, but an EyeFi like system to transfer my photos directly to a laptop (wirelessly!) would be great.

[sk66]

Well, the watermarking thing has potential. A program which allows you to choose font, color, size, transparency, position and alternatively a gif/ping for the watermark and has the ability to do batches... I think a "stand alone" program would be "substantial enough" and would prove extremely popular....even a "plugin" might be substantial enough if it had enough versatility/customization options...
I don't know if I'd use it, but I might. And I'll bet MANY others would.

A tool I *might* like to have would be one which would automatically go thru a folder of images and "group" images which have technical problems (i.e. out of focus)....Might help save time sorting out "the keepers" from obvious rejects, it would have to be able to work with Raw files for me...

[RoyL]

This is only a small job and I was going to code it myself sometime.

Both Camera Raw and Lightroom have the ability to create Presets but are not able to share them. The conversion process from Lightroom to Camera Raw is cumbersome yet the Preset files themselves are fairly standard, Camera Raw uses an xml format file and not sure about Lightroom. I found Adobe to be not too helpfull on the format of the Lightroom preset but it is easy to just extract the info required to build the preset, only the header is in a jumbled mess, the data is intact and readable with a text reader.

There is a huge base out there that use these Presets, I use emulations of old Film Emulsions to do various things to photo's. A tool to convert from Lightroom to Camera Raw would possibly even make you some dollars, and if it converted both ways then bonus.

I have searched the net and cannot find anything that does it.

[Jamesc359]

You could help The GIMP project with their efforts to integrate GEGL.

Or you could rewrite/enhance The GIMP's existing Color to Alpha filter to provide a curve feature. The interface would use a slider similar to the 3 point slider the Levels uses. It'd have a start point, mid point and end point. This would allow for a non-linear Color to Alpha. It would also be nice to be able to edit the curves along the individual color channels.

[DannyF1966]

I'd love a tool that would sort through all my photographs and put them into folders named "good", "bad", "indifferent", "could be photoshopped", "no chance" and "what the heck were you thinking?"

[Jim Bryant]

Originally Posted by DannyF1966

I'd love a tool that would sort through all my photographs and put them into folders named "good", "bad", "indifferent", "could be photoshopped", "no chance" and "what the heck were you thinking?"

Try Photo Mechanic........you can tag your photos different colors, then copy them into the good, bad, ugly folders and then delete the ugly.