I hasten to add that there is a one time set up procedure that can be tricky. There is glad help with this process - call Jon at 831-460-2648 or email him at jon@logicalpoetry.com. Also note that at this point FotoEase only runs on Microsoft Windows machines.

Index of Topics

What Does FotoEase Do?

1. Gets pictures from the Compact Flash reader.

   You can also choose any directory with images in it. See below.

2. Resizes and compresses the images making reasonably sized thumbnails and larger views.

   The size of the pictures and files is controlled with a configuration file.

3. Presents the pictures for viewing and selecting.

   Images can be omitted if they are out of focus or duplicated. They can be rotated.

4. Generates hyperlinked web pages to contain the images.

   Multiple pages of images link to each other. The thumbnails link to the larger views. Larger views link to each other in a kind of slideshow.

   Click on one of these pictures to see an example of a web page generated by FotoEase.

5. Transfers the pictures and web pages to your personal web space.

   What personal web space? You very likely have a few megabytes of web space provided by your ISP (internet service provider). Most people have not used their space simply because they haven't known how!

6. Sends Email to a mailing list.

   The letter will contain a link your friends and family can click on. They will go directly to the web pages you just created. You can edit the letter to describe what they will see.

To the index

One Time Set Up Procedure

Make a shortcut on the Desktop to C:\FotoEase\Ease\fotoease.exe.

Double click on C:\FotoEase\Ease\prefs.txt to bring up a text editor (usually NotePad). It will look something like this:

# for ftp'ing the files to the web
# we need a domain name, user name, password and
# an optional subdirectory underneath the home directory where
# web data is stored.
ftp_site peanutbutter.org
ftp_name jelly
ftp_pass sandwich
ftp_home pub_html

# the URL of the web site.
# FotoEase will make a 'fotoease' subdirectory there
# to contain its top level index file and the subdirectories
# of the picture collections.
home     http://www.peanutbutter.org/~jelly

... etc. ...

• ftp_site
• ftp_name
• ftp_pass

  The above values are needed to get access to your web space. If you aren't sure what they are call the support department of your ISP They will know.

• ftp_home

  This key may not be needed. Some ISPs have the web data in a subdirectory called 'www' or 'pub_html' or some other name. Some ISPs don't do this. Delete the entire line if it is not needed.

• home

  This is the address of your web site. Again, ask your ISP if you are not sure. FotoEase will make a subdirectory at this point to contain the picture collections and its top level index page.

• fromaddr

  This is your email address. It can be in this form with your full name:

  Grape Jelly <jelly@peanutbutter.org>

• smtp_server

  This is the mail server of your ISP. If your domain name is 'peanutbutter.org' the mail server is generally 'mail.peanutbutter.org'. Ask your ISP if you are not sure.

• picdir

  This is the location on your machine of the Compact Flash reader. For the Kodak DC290 it is:

  F:\DC290_01
  

• toptitle

  FotoEase will make a top level index page that lists the various picture collections you create. This key will set the title for that page. It could be something like:

  Pictures from the Johnson Family

To the index

Running FotoEase

Take your pictures. Remove the Compact Flash card from your camera and place it in the CF reader device connected to your computer.

Double click on the shortcut to fotoease.exe which you made on your desktop.

A window will appear that says "Please wait. Getting the pictures ...". A progress indicator will show green, then yellow and finally red.

May 1, 2005	Bjorn at the Wildflower Triathlon 2005
May 1, 2005	Bjorn at the Wildflower Triathlon 2005
February 9, 2005	Rallies and Protests in Boston - 2000

The first picture will be shown. At this point you have 15 commands each of which is described below. To invoke the command you can either click on the button at the bottom of the window or you can type the first letter of the command name. Typing is often much easier and faster than mousing around. That mouse can really slow you down!

• Next

  Move to the next picture.

  If you are at the last image you will return to the first. Pressing the zero key '0' at any place will also return to you to the first image.

• Back

  Move back to the previous picture. If you are at the first image you will move to the last one.

• Delete

  This picture is not acceptable for whatever reason - it is out of focus, duplicated, poorly composed, etc. Delete it from the pictures to include on the web site. Note that it is not really deleted. It is simply moved into the "Excluded" pile. See Switch below.

• Caption

  You can type a caption for the picture. You can make it as long as you would like since the entry window will scroll. Hit Return/Enter at the end and you will move to the next picture. If you want to break the line at a particular place put the two characters \n at the spot. Like this:

  The kids at the lake.\nDon't they look cute!
  

• Mark

  Mark this picture for later inserting. Nothing visible will happen. See Insert below.

• rotate

  Rotate the picture 90 degrees clockwise.

• Switch

  Switch to the Excluded pile (or to the Kept pile). The Delete command will move pictures from one of these piles to the other. Note that pictures in the Kept pile have a light green background (Go) and those in the Excluded pile have a light red background (Stop).

• Larger

  Show the larger image. When viewing the larger images this command changes to "Littler".

• Plus Q

  Increase the quality of the picture by reducing the file compression. See "Compression" below.

• Oh Q

  Decrease the quality of the picture by increasing the file compression. This makes for a smaller file size which is a good thing - as long as the file quality does not suffer too much. See "Compression" below.

  "Oh Q" was named that so that the first letter would be next to that for "Plus Q". Remember that this is a homemade program and does not need to follow any standards at all!

• Generate

  You have decided on a set of pictures to include on the web page. You have typed captions for the ones that need them. It is time to generate the web page. See "Generation" below.

• Insert

  Insert the marked picture (see "Mark" above) before the current one. Mark and Insert give you the ability to reorder the pictures however you want.

• Rotate

  Rotate the picture 90 degrees counter-clockwise. Note that r = clockwise and R = counter-clockwise.

• High Res

  Send the high resolution image to the web in case someone wants to see the image with the most detail or might want to download it for printing or further processing. The title bar will change to show that this will happen. Do not do this for too many images as it will take much longer to send the images to the web and you will use up your finite amount of web space much sooner. Choosing this command again will toggle it off and the high resolution image will not be sent.

  There will be a link to the high resolution image on the page where you view the larger image (not the thumbnail). The link will say "High Res" along with the file size in Kb. A note will be appended to any caption that a high resolution image is available.

• Quit

  Quit. Do not generate anything. You will be asked to confirm this action. A side benefit of this action is that all modifications and captions will be saved. You can always come back and generate the web site later.

To the index

Generation

After choosing the "Generate" command the picture window disappears and another window appears with 3 text fields for you to fill in:

• Title for Web Page and Subject of Email

  This will appear at the top of each page of thumbnails and also is the subject of the email that is sent. It cannot be left blank.

• Name for Photo Directory

  The pictures are stored in C:\FotoEase\Fotos in a subdirectory named after the current date. This will not be very memorable in two months. You can change it here. Shorter is better than longer. Any non-alphabetic character will be changed to an underscore '_'.

• Text of Email

  The text here will be sent via email to your friends and family. Edit it as you wish but do not change the string %link%. If you find that you are always adding the same greeting or closing you can do this once by putting them in the file C:\FotoEase\Ease\letter.txt.

When you have finished the above you can press the green "Proceed" button. Three things will happen:

1. The web pages will be generated.

2. The pages and the pictures will be transfered to your web space (this takes a while).

3. Email will be sent to the mailing list.

FotoEase has done all it can and it will exit automatically.

There are checkboxes on the generate dialog to enable you to choose which of the above 3 things you may not wish to do. Note, however, that you can't transfer pages that have not already been generated!

Top Level Index

There are two other checkboxes that control how FotoEase deals with the "Top Level Index". If "Link to Top Level" is checked FotoEase will make a link on the thumbnail pages to a higher level page containing an index of your picture collections. This page has the list of titles that you have given for the the collections you have generated. Along with the titles are the dates they were created and a link to the collection itself. This is a way to see the history of your picture taking. The collections are listed in reverse chronological order.

If you want to delete an old collection, check the box entitled "Delete Old Items On Top Index". A dialog will appear for you to select the items you don't want.

The Mailing List

On the generate dialog there is an entry window with the label "Send Email to:". This is by default set to "addrs.txt" which is the text file where you put the all the email addresses of the friends and family that you wish to see the pictures. In this entry window you can put filenames or email addresses separated by commas or spaces. If you have an alternate mailing list file you can put its name here. If you have additional email addresses you can put them here as well. For example, you could replace "addrs.txt" with "altaddrs.txt raspberry@jam.com".

To the index

Compression

The title bar of the picture dialog contains information about compression and other things. The basic information is: the image number, the quality level, the file size in bytes. The quality and file size will change for the little or the larger size image (see Larger - Littler). If you are looking at an excluded image the title will be begin with "Excluded: ". If you have turned the high resolution choice "on" the title will end with "Send High Resolution".

Having said all of this, it is rare that you will need to worry about changing the compression. 60 is usually good enough and most people have fairly fast connections these days.

To the index

Processing an Existing Collection

Remove the compact flash card from the reader and invoke FotoEase. It will not find any pictures in the usual picdir location and will launch a directory selection dialog - you can use it to choose the directory containing your images.

Select (single click not double) a directory on the left hand side and choose "Accept". The ".." directory will go to the directory above if you wish. FotoEase will copy the images in the chosen directory to the C:\FotoEase\Fotos folder as if they were coming from the compact flash reader.

If you choose a directory in the C:\FotoEase\Fotos subfolder that was created by FotoEase then it will immediately start where it left off. The first picture will come up right away with all captions in place. You can proceed. You would use this mode of operation if you wanted to regenerate the web pages or if you wished to send the web address to a few more people.

To the index

Minor Keys

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Commercial Products

May 1, 2005	Bjorn at the Wildflower Triathlon 2005
May 1, 2005	Bjorn at the Wildflower Triathlon 2005
February 9, 2005	Rallies and Protests in Boston - 2000
$49.95	ACDSee 5.0
$44.95	iO Presentation Manager 3.2
$45.00	Paint Shop Photo Album 4
$29.99	Picasa 1.5
free	PreClick Photo Organizer 1.2
$29.95	Ulead Photo Explorer 8.0
$49.99	Adobe Photoshop Album

To the index

Examples of Photo Collections Made with FotoEase

Maurice the Cat - Katy Brownfield


Family Swimming Party - Jon Bjornstad

Send email to Jon if you want your collection included here.