If you’re like most people, you know it doesn’t take much to wind up with the computer jammed with thousands of photos named IMG_2189.jpg. Picasa is a great one-stop tool that helps you organize and edit your photos fast and easy.

Here is a step by step guide to help you organize and easily edit your photo collections in Picasa:

Step 1: Organize Your Images.

Add photos to Picasa

After downloading Picasa (free) and installing it, it will begin looking for and organizing all the photos and videos on your hard drive. Use Picasa to view photos already on your computer, or to import photos from your camera.

Depending on the number of pictures stored on your computer, the initial scan may take a while to complete. If you really have a ton of photos and want to skip a complete check, you can select which folders you’d like Picasa to scan.

Control the folders that display

If you only want Picasa to display certain folders, go to the Tools tab and select Folder Manager. Choose the folders you want Picasa to display and for more advanced settings, go to the Tools tab again and select Options.

Once Picasa completes the initial scan, you will have all your photo collections at your fingertips. To make it easy to find your photos, here are 2 more tweaks for you:

Rename your photos

After your photos have been uploaded to Picasa, you’ll see that there are a gazillion files that were not intuitively labeled with Picasa, which makes them very difficult to find and use. And the last you’ll want to do is rename those individually. This is where Picasa can help you: batch renaming, or renaming a whole bunch of photos at once.

Here are the steps to do it:

1. Locate the folder where the pictures are stored.
2. Select the photos you want to rename (use the Shift key to select multiple files).
3. Select “File” and “Rename” (use the F2 shortcut).
4. Think of a new name for your group of photos.
5. Click “Rename” and you’re done.

Now, instead of 10 photos labeled helplessly “IMG_2189.jpg” (and so on), you’ll have 10 photos labeled “Thanksgiving Day 2011″.

Here are two more tips to help you further organize your photos within folders:

1. When you collections include more and more folders, you have couple of views to choose from. Go to the View tab, select View -> Folder View and choose between Tree View and Flat Folder View (I find this one easier to manage).
2. Once you’ve uploaded your photos to Picasa, do not make any more tweaks and changes to your collections using Windows Explorer. You might lose your edits and you’ll definitely confuse Picasa.

Create your own filing system

Once you get passed the basic folder organization, Picasa enables you to further sort your files with one more option: gold stars.

While you’re organizing your files, you’ll definitely come across a photo you’ll want to be able to find easily later. Just like starring your e-mails, Picasa enables you to also star your favorite photos.

Simply click on the Star button in the Photo Tray (right above the ‘Upload’ button) and that photo will be starred. Later, you can group all the starred photos in one folder. If you want to star more photos at a time, just click on the Shift key and you’re done.

Step 2: Make Your Photos Look Pretty.

If you need a one-click fix to red eye, crooked shots, cropping, color, lightning or zoom, Picasa has everything you need to adjust your photos fast and easy.

To edit an individual photo, double-click on the thumbnail in the Picasa library and you’re taken to the editing panel. You’ll see the 3 tabs to the left: Basic Fixes, Tuning, and Effects.

Basic fixes

This is probably where you’ll be spending most of your time. You can crop, fix crooked shots, remove red eye and correct contrast and color. You can also use the “I’m Feeling Lucky” button and let Picasa choose the best tweaks for your image (it usually turns out pretty nice).

Anything you do can be immediately undone with the useful Undo button (also use Ctrl + Z). Anyway, changes are not final until you click on the Save Changes button. Make the changes, click the Back to Library button and press the Save Changes button (the tiny blue button, next to the ‘Share’ button) in the album header.

Now, your changes have been overwritten the original image, but your originals are safely stored for you in a folder called “Originals”.

Tuning

The Tuning tab opens a set of sliders that helps you correct lightning in your photos. Here are the 4 actions:

• Fill light: corrects background lighting while keeping the foreground intact
• Highlights: brightens up the entire photo
• Shadows: darkens up the whole picture
• Color temperature: tweaks the colors in your image

You’ll get the best results if you apply these together, not just one at a time. Just like the Basic Fixes tab, you can also ask Picasa to do the work for you.

Effects

You can apply 12 cool effects, including:

• Warmify: warms up the skin tones and other colors
• Glow: creates  a cool fuzzy effect
• Focal Black & White: desaturates your photo around a central point
• Sepia: ages your photo

You also have sliders that allow you to dose the amount of sharpness, blur, saturation, tint and so on. The Cancel button is always at hand to undo your actions.

Batch editing

You can even edit multiple pictures at once. Select multiple files, go to the Picture tab and select Batch Edit. If you want to pick images from multiple albums, hit the small green Hold button in the Photo Tray (at the bottom of the window) and search for the images you want fixed.

You can also undo multiple edits to multiple pictures by picking the photos using the CTRL key, right-clicking on them and selecting Undo all edits.

Trust me, there are a lot more ways to have fun with Picasa than basic photo editing and organization. This is an amazing tool that allows you to mix your tweaks and get really creative with your photos.

This mini guide will simplify the entire process for you, but first, here are the basics:

The Difference Between Picasa And Picasa Web Albums

Picasa is a software that you install on your computer and use it both as a manager and an editor for your images. Picasa Web Albums is a website that provides free storage space to upload your files into actual web albums and easily share them with friends and family.

Folders vs. Albums vs. Web Albums

Folders in Picasa represent the actual folders on your hard drive. When you delete a picture from a folder in Picasa, you’re actually deleting the original file from your disk.

Albums are an amazing tool for organizing your files that point to photos that are in already-existing folders. You can only use them as long as Picasa is running and they do not actually contain the images.

Web Albums are only created when you ask Picasa to upload and share your collections.

Step 1: Create An Album In Picasa.

Open Picasa. You can freely download it from Google. Choose the images you want to include in your web album. You can upload entire folders or individual files. Click on the desired folder or hold down the Shift key to select the photos individually.

To create an album, follow these steps:

1. Go to the left of the screen and look in your folders for the photos you want to use.
2. Select the ones you want to include in the album and send them to the Photo Tray (the lower-left corner of the window).
3. Once all your selections are in the Photo Tray, click the Add Selected Items to an Album button (with the little black arrow) on the Photo Tray.
4. Click on the New album button. You can also add the files          to an existing album in the menu on the left.
5. In the Album Properties window, insert the name of the album and a brief description (optional).
6. Click OK and you’re done.

You can locate the newly created album at the top of the left-side menu. You can easily change the details (e.g. title, date, place taken, privacy settings) of your album:

1. Right-click on the album you’d like to edit, select Edit Album Description.
2. Update your album with the new information.
3. Click OK when you’re finished.

Step 2: Upload Your Album To Picasa Web Albums.

Now you’re ready to upload your album to Picasa Web Albums. You’ve got two options:

1. Right-click on the album you’d like to upload and select Upload to Picasa Web Albums.
2. If you’re already inside the album, right-click anywhere in the white space and select Upload to Picasa Web Albums.

Both actions will take you to the same pop-up window, where you’ll be prompted for the following information:

1. Name and Description (click on the New button to update your information).
2. Size (if you just want to share your photos, I suggest the medium size).
3. Visibility (I personally make my albums public).

Next, click on the Upload button and the Upload Manager will upload your photos to Picasa Web Albums. When it’s finished, press the View Online button and check your album online. Now you will see all your pictures in the Picasa Web Album.

Step 3: Make Changes To Your Picasa Web Albums.

You can change the album cover by clicking on the Actions tab and selecting Album Cover. You’ll be prompted to choose the new cover for your album. You can also re-arrange your photos to appear in a specific order. Click on the Organize tab and drag the photo thumbnails into your preferred order.

Another cool feature is the Sync to web function. Basically it allows you to manage your online album without visiting Picasa Web Albums. So, the changes you make in Picasa will appear immediately in your online gallery. Besides photo corrections, you can sync the changes for captions, tags and geotags.

Step 4: Protect Your Photos Against Theft.

We usually publish our photo collections online to make them easier to share with friends and family. The last thing you’d want to see is your Christmas tree being featured in some magazine article.

Unfortunately, image theft is more serious than ever before and there is not much you can do to protect your images from being downloaded. However, two strategies seem to discourage others from stealing your photos: publishing low-resolution files only and watermarking them prior publication.

You may achieve the best results by mixing these two techniques, but it’s not always possible. For example, you can’t post low-res files if you need a great showcase for your images. This is when  you need to watermark your photos.

Visual Watermark is a free watermark software that enables you to mix 2 types of watermarks: graphics and text. If you have your business logo saved as a picture file on your desk, you can use it to watermark your images. If not, you can create a logo using text watermarks and fonts on your disk.

Follow these steps to use the Visual Watermark:

• go to http://www.visualwatermark.com/;
• click on the Free trial button;
• pick any number of photos to watermark;
• go to the watermark editor;
• add any many text & graphic watermarks as you want;
• hit the Watermark button and the software will begin watermarking your photos.

Here are some more cool features:

Instantly resizes watermarks – The program allows you to instantly watermark portrait, landscape and any cropped images. This is because it detects the different sizes and properly resizes the watermark.

Customize your watermarks with cool effects – You can apply a variety of effects to customize your images with unique watermarks. Choose from transparency, shadow, glow, gradient overlay and stroke filters that can be used in any combination.

Apply the watermark anywhere in the picture – You can apply the watermark any place in the photo by clicking & dragging it with the mouse.

As you can see, there are so many ways to use Picasa and although you can’t totally protect your online galleries against theft, you can reduce the number of downloads using a good watermark

You’ve probably created your first panoramas by now, so it’s time to share them with the world. If you don’t know how to create them, read our recent post.

There may be other free programs to create panoramas, but since we intend to share them online I highly encourage you to use CleVR. It’s a convenient 2-in-1 tool, both stitching software and an online service that can be used separately.

So, if you’ve stitched your photos with the CleVR software, you’ve probably noticed that the program does not only create interactive virtual tours out of your images, but these can also be rotated side to side, up and down and zoomed in and out.

Here are a few simple steps to take your panoramas online:

Uploading

Once you’ve created them, panoramas can be either saved as JPEG files on your computer or uploaded to CleVR.com and the stitcher will transform them into an interactive view that can be shared or embedded.

Uploading is quite easy. When you click on the ‘Upload button’ you will have to name your image and provide several tags and a short description (optional).

It will take a little time for the panorama to be uploaded and you will see a preview of the final image. The + and – buttons will zoom in and out and you can rotate the image by clicking and dragging it with your mouse. The process is pretty straightforward and this is all you need to do. Click on the ‘View’ button at the bottom to check your panorama.

Embedding

The coolest feature of CleVR is definitely their panorama viewer. Once your panorama is uploaded, you can get the embed code to share it and post it on your blog, like with any YouTube video.

Embedding is a simple Flash-based process and your panoramas can be easily viewed in any web browser. For most websites, you just copy the code from the “Embed” box on the panorama page and paste on the site you want to use it. You can also share your panoramas on Facebook, MySpace or send them by mail (one click of a button).

If you want to tweak your panorama a little bit, you can retouch it in Photoshop. You should edit the finished panorama and not each image that made the panorama.

If you are using the CleVR stitcher, you can export the panorama so you can edit it Photoshop or other editing software. The program offers an Export option in the ‘File’ menu and once you’re done editing, you can then reopen it in the CleVR stitcher and continue as usual.

Adding HotSpots

You must have seen the ‘Edit Hotspots’ button by now, which is another great feature of CleVR. Basically, hotspots are areas on the panorama that viewers can click on to get additional information, in the form of text, an image, a video or a link to another of your panoramas.

You can start adding hotspots to your panoramas by simply clicking on ‘Edit Hotspots‘ and then ‘Add Hotspot‘. The program prompts you to drag a rectangle around the area you want to highlight and it will become clickable.

When you’re done, you will see a box where you’ll have to add a name for your hotspot, a description, a link of an image file or, you can choose another panorama to link to. Your hotspots are automatically saved as you create them and you can also add more later on the web.

One of the most exciting ways to use hot spots is to link panoramas together into a full virtual tour (e.g. create panoramas of each room in your home and them put everything together and create an interactive tour of the house). Plus, CleVR also allows you to organize your panoramas into groups and easily move between locations.

The software is very easy to use, allowing all non-geek users to effortlessly create their own panoramas in a fully automated process. All you need to do is log to your CleVR account, select the images you want to use for your panorama, drag and drop your files and press the ‘Stitch’ button.

You will have the perfect panorama in a matter of minutes. Next, it will upload it to CleVR. Com and your panorama is now ready to view and share. But as with most tools of this kind, the larger the file size and higher the resolution, the slower your photos are processed. To make it go faster, select medium sized photos of no more than 200 KB.

Alternative to CleVR

Photosynth is a free Windows-based panorama application with iPhone & iPad versions that allows you to capture, upload and share 360-degree panoramas.

The app lets you take pictures in all directions, up, down, left and right using Full-sphere Panoramas function and then easily share them on Facebook or Bing Maps.

Another great feature of this app is its live image tracking in the viewfinder, which totally sets it apart from other pano apps. The cool thing about using Photosynth is that you can actually see the panorama coming to life, as you shoot your images using the Interactive Capture function.

You can also view the final image right away using the o-device processing and the end result is a sharp, high quality interactive panorama produced with the Photosynth Advanced Image Stitching Engine.

You can view and share your panoramas at any time using the on-device library and you can save as many as you want and see them later online at www.photosynth.net.

Download the app for free from the iTunes App Store:
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/photosynth/id430065256?mt=8

Here is a quite a nifty presentation:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6BbuPPOVXQo

Well, these are just some of the things you can do if you get a little creative with your camera (or iPhone). Test these tools for yourself and see what works for you. These are all easy to use applications and from your camera to the web it only takes a few minutes.

If you’re like most people, you’ve already discovered the Panorama mode or function on your camera. You’ve probably tried it a few times, didn’t really know what to expect and gave up. While not all cameras have a distinct single-shot panoramic setting, you can still create your own panoramas following some very simple steps.

Here are a few pointers to help you create panoramas in a few easy steps:

How To Shoot The Pictures

First, you don’t need to use a special camera, a tripod or any expensive equipment. Basically, all you need to do is hold your camera as still as possible and try to keep it at the same level. Take one shot and then turn to take the next shot, making sure that it overlaps the previous one by at least 30%. Continue until you reach your end point.

Move the camera as if it was mounted on a tripod, so hold it in place and instead rotate around the imaginary tripod. If you want to create a full 360 degree panorama, make a full circle and overlap your last picture with the first one.

Although I said that you don’t need any other equipment, your panoramas will look so much better using a few simple tools and suggestions:

Tripod

The tripod ensures that your camera rotates around a fixed axis and that it stays level while you are shooting. It also enables you to take longer exposures, so you can create a cool night cityscape with everything in focus.

Panoramic Head

A panoramic head helps you to precisely arrange your camera so that when you turn it for the next shot you are rotating it around a fixed point. This little tool also makes your shootings easier and prevents you from wasting a lot of time trying to stitch the images together afterwards.

Wide Angle Lens

By shooting several pictures you can combine them to create a 360 degree panoramic image, no matter what lens you use. A wide angle lens allows you to:

• Take less pictures than with a prime lens
• Capture shots on vertical rows so the picture doesn’t look like a tight slit

Use A Large Depth Of Field

Usually, panoramas are all about capturing the beauty of a landscape and not taking snapshots of people or events. So, you will probably want to get sharp images that capture the entire landscape over the horizon.

To get such crisp shots, you need to set a large aperture (say up to f/20) so that everything remains in focus. Setting the camera to AV (Auto Exposure) mode will also help you control the depth of field.

Shoot During The Golden Hours

Also known as magic hour in cinematography, the golden hours provide the best lighting conditions. These are early morning and late afternoon hours, when the light is soft and gives the landscape a warm look.

How To Create Spherical Panoramas

If you are just staring out with to panoramic photography, there is no need to buy any special lens until you have experimented with a few panoramas. This will give you a good idea of whether you want or need any other equipment, such as a wide angle lens.

To create spherical panoramas, use the 8mm fish-eye lens, which is usually the widest lens available, to create an 180-degree perspective in all directions.

You need to:

• Attach a fisheye lens to your camera to capture at least 180-degree vertical views of the horizon
• Take multiple rows of shots (add some ‘up’ and ‘down’ shots) to increase the depth of field

Later, you can also convert the spherical images into rectilinear panoramas and stitch them together.

How To Stitch The Images Together

Now that you’ve taken the shots, it’s time to move on to the next part: Stitching. If you are just starting out with panoramas, I assume you don’t have any stitching software, so I suggest you use CleVR, a free panoramic photo stitching and sharing service.

Basically, stitching is the process of combining multiple shots into a single, perfect image and CleVR allows you to stitch your panoramas, upload and share them online. You can download the software here: http://www.clevr.com/

To use the stitcher, you’ll need to go to their site and set up a free CleVR account. Once you’ve logged into your account, you’ll be prompted to install the software on your computer.

You’ll also need to download and install Adobe Air, as the stitcher is an Adobe Air application. Once you have installed it, you can start using the stitcher in 3 simple steps:

1. Select your images.

Drag your photos to the empty box or click ‘Choose Images’. You can add as many shots as you want, there is no limit whatsoever.

2. Arrange the images in the right order.

Once you’ve added the images, you can rotate them or reverse their order.

3. Click the ‘Stitch’ button.

Next, click ‘Stitch’ to begin processing the photos and you will finally create your panorama. Two more steps: save your panorama as a JPEG format on your computer and then upload it to the CleVR site to distribute it online.

You can also use the build-in image enhancer on their site to slightly adjust the image in case it’s under or over exposed.

More Stitching Tools:

Although I highly recommend using CleVR, especially if you’re just starting out with panoramas, here is a list of other photo stitching programs you may want to play with:

• Autostitch: http://cs.bath.ac.uk/brown/autostitch/autostitch.html
• PTgui: http://www.ptgui.com/
• PTAssembler: http://www.tawbaware.com/ptasmblr.htm
• Microsoft Image Composite Editor: http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/redmond/groups/ivm/ICE/
• Hugin (http://hugin.sourceforge.net/)

Hugin is a free and open source photo stitching program with a twist. The difference between Hugin and CleVR is that Hugin does not require the shots to be taken side-by-side. Their tool will combine a grid of images instead of arranging them all in a line.

As you can see, there is a slight learning curve with panoramas, but following these simple techniques you’ll soon produce some amazing results.

P.S. Here I show how to showcase your panoramas online.

The most popular photo editing software on the market is undoubtedly Adobe Photoshop. Most professional photographers use this software, which is known as Adobe Photoshop CS5, although it is quite complicated and takes a lot of learning, plus it is rather expensive. However, many of it’s basic edition options are easy to understand,  therefore a beginner user may obtain exceptional results.  Adobe Photoshop CS5 is not recommended  for amateur photographers,  it is best to start with the simpler, and much less expensive versions.

Adobe Photoshop Lightroom (for PC)  is the software preferred by many photographers. It is far less complicated than CS5,  yet still produces professional results. It is quite user friendly and offers many of the facilities that CS5 has. The intuitive environment and controls of Lightroom are easy to master and let you quickly and smoothly accomplish your essential photography tasks.

Screenshot copyright “Softonic“

Aperture is similar to Lightroom, but is for MAC use. It has many of the same features and is easy to master. Aperture has a great feature that recognises faces and places, allowing you to organise your photos easily. Aperture uses face/place detection technology to find faces/places in your photos. Once you identify a person or place, it quickly scans your library to find more photos that match. For example, you took 2000 pictures at a wedding and you want to find all the photos with the brides sister in. Once you have identified her face in one photo, Aperture finds other photographers that she appears in, then you simply confirm the suggested matches. Simple.

Screenshot copyright “TopTenReviews.com“

GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program), is a free software application graphics editor, primarily employed as an image retoucher and editing tool. It is widely available on  the internet and there are many versions of the software. It is tailored for the most popular operating systems including Microsoft Windows, Apple Mac and Linux.

GIMP stands for General Image Manipulation Program, but in 1997 it became part of the GNU Project.  The acronym GIMP was changed to GNU Manipulation Program, but is still widely known as GIMP.  You can download it free,  for whichever operating system that you use here: http://www.gimp.org/

While it is quite basic compared to Photoshop CS5, it has all the basic tools than an amateur photographer needs. Once mastered, it gives a good base knowledgeable for using the more advanced software programs.

Picasa is free photo editing software from Google, it is available to download here: http://picasa.google.com/thanks.html

Picasa is very simple to use, even for the most technology challenged. It improves almost any picture with a ‘one-click fix’ for common problems like red-eye, colour, and lighting. It also has tuning and some special effects for more creative projects. It’s simplicity lends to being one of the most downloaded free photo editor currently available.

Phocus is also a free  photo editor, and is available for download here:

http://www.hasselblad.com/products/phocus.aspx

“Phocus software provides all the power, performance and advanced tools that discerning professionals desire in an easy-to-use and attractive working environment, making even the largest files simple to handle.“

The main problem with the Phocus software is that it will only process Hasselblad’s version of a RAW file. If you take your pictures in RAW, then you won’t be able to benefit from this software, but if Hasselblad is your thing, this software will do all  the tricks that you need.

Inkscape as another very good free photo/image editor. It’s available for most operating systems including Windows (newer versions only) and Mac. Inkscape is available as a free download here: http://inkscape.org/download/?lang=en

Inkscape is an open-source vector graphics editor similar to Adobe Illustrator. In contrast to raster (bitmap) graphics editors such as Photoshop or Gimp, Inkscape stores its graphics in a vector format. Vector graphics are a complement, rather than an alternative, to bitmap graphics. Each has its own purpose and are useful for different kinds of things. Raster graphics tend to be better for photographs and some kinds of artistic drawings, whereas vectors are more suitable for design compositions, logos, images with text, technical illustrations, etc. Inkscape can import and display bitmap images, too. An imported bitmap becomes yet another object in your vector graphics, and you can do with it everything you can do to other kinds of objects (move, transform, clip, etc.)

GIMP, Picasa, Phocus and Inkscape are all free software, therefore making them very attractive to many photographers, amateurs and professionals alike. They should only be downloaded from the sites that produce them, hence eliminating the risk of viruses.

Whatever you photo editing requirements are, there is a software out there to suit your needs, and pockets. It is best to start with the simpler programs and work your way up to the more advanced ones. Enjoy taking the pictures, enjoy the editing, enjoy the end results.

Original photo with a small watermark in the center

We removed the watermark but added significant watermark footprint

We removed the watermark using photo editing software. Remaining defects on the restored picture are so invisible that the photo can be easily stolen.

Does it mean that watermarks in general are insecure? No. Watermarks are secure if you use them properly. Look at the next pictures to understand how you can improve the watermark.

Original photo with a small watermark in the upper-right corner

We removed the watermark with no artifacts

What is the difference between the pictures above?

First of all, we placed the new watermark in the centre of the photo. Watermark position is a crucial factor that can make your watermark exceptionally strong or useless.

For clarity, we split the image that you want to protect into three areas. Placing the watermark in these areas will guarantee you a different degree of protection.

	Worst protection		Better protection		Best protection

Placing the watermark in the corner of the picture makes your protection as weak as possible. The worst decision in this case is to reduce the watermark size. However, such watermark (especially, small watermark) affects the overall picture expression as little as possible.

The yellow area is an excellent place for your watermark because it doesn’t allow an easy crop to remove the watermark. It can still be removed using a pixel-by-pixel retouching, but that is a hard task by itself.

The center of the picture is the best place to put your watermark. This is the most detailed part of the picture. So this way of watermarking makes the protection stronger. In addition, your watermark is particularly noticeable.

If your watermark seems to irritate the viewers (too noticeable), just make it translucent.

Opaque watermark (no transparency)	Translucent watermark (70% transparency)

The second distinction is photo coverage. The watermark is large enough to protect most of the picture’s details. As the result, this watermark can’t be removed without remarkable effects to the image. A good-sized watermark should cover at least approximately 30% of the photo.

Protected photo with bigger watermark

Noticeable artifacts after watermark removal

To restore this picture we have used the same technique as before. You see there are lots of defects on the picture so that we are not able to use it unauthorized way. Combining these two approaches above, you can considerably improve watermark security.

Auto-scaled watermarks

This feature allows watermarking landscape, portrait and cropped photos at once. If the watermark is too big to fit into a photo, Visual Watermark will scale it down to look similar on all photos.

Watermark Preview

New version of our watermark software shows watermark previews inside photo thumbnails. It allows to check the watermark is aligned properly on all photos and correct the placement if it doesn’t.

Drag Photos Directly to the Program

We’re tired of the standard open file dialog. Now, you can simply drag your photos directly to the program, and it will select them for watermarking automatically. You can even drag an iPhoto album to the program!

Watermark Templates

Visual Watermark saves your watermark template to the disc when you quit the program. When you start Visual Watermark to watermark more photos, you don’t need to create watermark template from scratch anymore.

These four features above turn Visual Watermark into a “drag-n-click” tool for watermarking photos.

Improved Activation

Yes, we heard your complaints about cumbersome activation process. Now, it is much more straightforward.

Thank you so much for pointing us to problems and suggesting new feature. I appreciate your help!

P.S. This update is free to all our customers – download the program and replace your current copy. 

As a self-employed artist, or photographer, you have to pay an ordinary income tax as everybody else does and additional “self-employment” tax which does not exist for people living on a wage.

Self-employment tax

Self-employment tax is social security contributions for a photographer/artist. Normally, when you are employed by someone else, the employer is responsible for these payments. However, when you are a freelancer, you must pay the full amount yourself.

You should deduct all your expenses from your gross income before calculating your social contributions because the self-employment tax is paid on net income only. The SE tax rate on net earnings in 2011 is 13.3% (10.4% social security tax plus 2.9% Medicare tax). Only the first $106,800 of your earnings in 2011 is subject to the 10.4% social security part of the tax. In other words, your social security tax contributions will not exceed $13,243.20; it doesn’t matter how much you earn.

You can deduct half of your self-employment tax in figuring your adjusted gross income. This deduction only affects your income tax. It does not affect either your net earnings from self-employment or your self-employment tax. Under Section 2042 of the Small Business Jobs Act, a deduction, for income tax purposes, self-employed artists are allowed to deduct the cost of health insurance. This is significant tax cut since these days health insurance for a freelance photographer costs an arm and a leg.

Income tax

Although it seems like we already cut a pretty fair portion of income, you pay to satisfy federal income tax demands, most of us had better braced ourselves for a increase in our 2011 federal tax returns as the deficit is comingon track to hit new highs.

Many tax cuts enacted by President Bush in 2001 and 2003 are set to expire in 2010. Older government designed the cuts to support all income levels: America’s low-, middle-, and higher-income workers. Hopefully, President Obama and Congress have approved a two-year extension to all the Bush-era tax cuts. This means that the 2011 federal IRS tax rates will be the same as 2010 rates, shown in the table below. However, tax bracket ranges and standard deduction levels have increased slightly due to low inflation. A rise in tax rates would have cut the after-tax pay by $3,000 for the average tax payer, so the tax rates extension is worth a lot given current economic conditions. However, the extension is only for 2 years, and unless the economy actually tanks, you shouldn’t look for these to be extended again in 2013.

Married Individuals Filing Joint Returns and Surviving Spouses

Heads of Households

Unmarried Individuals (other than Surviving Spouses and Heads of Households)

Source: www.irs.gov

In addition to federal taxes, some states apply local taxes.

You have to estimate your next quarter earnings and pay income tax in advance. If you pay too much, you can return this money by filling an annual return before April 15 of the next year (Form 1040 + Schedule C). However, returning overpaid is usually a extremely long process so make sure not to overpay too much.

Deductions

Many deductions can be claimed by self-employed persons like photographers. It is in your best interest to be aware of them. For example, 100-percent deductibles include production costs, business cards and brochures, membership dues and training costs. Under Section 2042 of the Small Business Jobs Act, self-employed photographers and artists are allowed to deduct the cost of health insurance. You should always include it in your annual tax return since it will save a considerable amount of money.

Inconsistent bookkeeping may result in penalties from IRS. Keep yourself out of trouble with the IRS by learning a set of ’3 Bs’ — bookkeeping, bookkeeping and (you guessed it) bookkeeping. IRS studies show that poor records, not dishonesty, cause most small-business owners to lose at audits or fail to comply with their tax reporting obligations, with resulting penalties. Even if you hire someone to keep your records, you need to know how to supervise her – because if she fails, you are the one held responsible.

• Consider using a computer to keep your records if you aren’t already in the electronic age.
• Keep all receipts and canceled checks for business expenses, and keep them organized and in a safe place.
• Separate the documents by category, such as auto expenses, rent, utilities, etc. Put your documents into separate folders or envelopes.

If you are ever audited, the IRS is most likely to zero in on business deductions for travel and recreation and car expenses. Furthermore, the burden will be on you – not the IRS – to substantiate your deductions. If you’re unsure how to get started or what documents you need to keep, consult a tax professional familiar with small business bookkeeping.

Sales Tax

Sales taxes are complex and require significant attention. For instance, if you work in more than one state, use models or work with reps in one or more states, you may be required to pay sales tax in each if the states that apply. In particular, if you work with an out-of-state stock photo agency that has clients over a large geographic area, you should review you tax liability with a tax professional. As with all taxes, you must report and pay them on a timely basis to avoid audits and penalties. In regard to sales taxes, you should:

• Always register your company at the tax offices with jurisdiction in your city and state;
• Always charge and collect sales tax on the full amount of the invoice, unless an exemption applies;
• If an exemption applies because of resale, you must provide a copy of thebuyer’s resale certificate.
• If an exemption applies because of other conditions, such as selling one-time reproduction rights or working for a tax-exempt, nonprofit organization, you must also provide documentation.

In total, the taxes above will result in about 28% if you live in Miami or 36% if you live in San Francisco. Share your tips to make them lower.

Today, I wanted to speak about personal finances of a self-employed person – photographers, artists and freelancers in general. I started Visual Watermark as a part-time project while working with my ex-employer DevExpress Inc. It was fun and easy side-project since it yields small but steady revenue and didn’t require too much effort to support it. This year I left my day job to fully concentrate on my side-project.

This move gave me an opportunity to do what engages me a lot and still much more flexibility to spend time with my small baby. On another hand, it cut our revenues in half. I don’t have “extra” money anymore, money to buy a trip to the ocean without putting aside for a few months or money that I can put into business development if necessary. I still had enough to pay my expenses but no penny above that.

One day, I received an email from Google that my Adwords account was blocked because of insufficient funds on my card. I thought it was wrong, because I take all funds from my account for personal needs and left $300 on my business card to pay for the ads. Google never charged me more than that before and I expect these funds to be enough to pay the bill.

The bill was $302.94. Only $2.94 is missing! This is evening and Friday, there is nobody in the bank, nobody will take some cash from me to add to the account. What’s the heck! Google will stop showing my ads and I will loose several hundreds during this weekends.

Fortunately, Adwords doesn’t stop showing ads immediately – it tries to charge the card the other day. Only when it fails several times, it blocks the ads. Hopefully, I was saved. Unfortunately, similar cases happened several times after that.

I’ve learned from this case that you should separate business and your own wallets. Your business isn’t you and you have to draw a line between your finances and business finances.

Your business “hires” you and pays you a salary to make living. It sounds weird for a freelancer photographer who is an employee and employer at the same time or a self-employed person in general but you should think about you as about an employee you’ve hired.

You have to pay a salary to the employee (you), pay business expenses and taxes. If there is still something left means you make profit. If there are not enough funds to pay the bills you make loses, you need to borrow some cash to pay the bills or taxes. If you use your personal funds to pay your business debts, you will lower your life quality – you will have to buy worse food, use a car or go out less frequently. If you take your business funds for your personal needs, you slow down your business. You may use this money to buy advertising to find new clients, or buy new equipment to make better shots, or repair your studio. Without separation of your personal and business incomes you won’t be able to build a sustainable and profitable business.

You should figure out how much you need to support your current life style and make it your “salary”. Figure out your expenses – transportation, advertising, equipment rent and everything else. Even paper you use to print invoices has to be included to your expenses. Now subtract both these numbers from your revenues. If the result is more than zero, you make profit; if it’s less than zero – I’m sorry – you loose money every month. If you loose money, you should cut your expenses or increase pricing.

We have tested Visual Watermark for compatibility issues yesterday and unfortunately found one. Program toolbar is mangled – question signs are painted instead of normal buttons we all expect to see on the toolbar. It seems Apple engineers removed these rounded buttons from their OS completely.

Hopefully, we were able to quickly change button styles to rectangular and now it looks OK. I believe now they look even better and up to date because old rounded buttons looked outdated in the new sharp Lion UI.

This update is already available on our website and is free to all existing customers. Simply download new version and replace your current installation. No “re-activation” required.

Download link