Pocket Painter 2.10 Released, With VGA/SE Support

[Janak Parekh]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.aidem.com.tw/English/en_pocketpainter.htm' target='_blank'>http://www.aidem.com.tw/English/en_...cketpainter.htm</a><br /><br /></div><i>"Pocket Painter is a high efficient and high quality image processing and painting tool for Pocket PC. With AIDEM's Pocket Painter, you can modify photos and images, apply filter and special effects on them, free style painting, and much more. Due to more and more high level Pocket PCs, such as ASUS A730, HP iPAQ hx4700, and Toshiba e830…, support VGA mode display, AIDEM decided to enhance the feature of VGA mode display. Now users could use Pocket Painter to view and edit their photos in VGA mode with these devices."</i><br /><br /><img src="http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/images/web/2003/parekh-20050131-PocketPainter.gif" /><br /><br />We haven't mentioned Pocket Painter much on these forums -- has anyone used it, and if so, what's their impression?

[robert_biggs]

I've use'd this program for about 2 years and really like it. I wanted a program for editing small images (especially for skinning on the PPC). All other image editing software that had the features I wanted were at least twice the price of this program. I'd highly recommend it. :)

[Menneisyys]

has anyone used it, and if so, what's their impression?

Explicit SE support is certainly good news; however, the previous version (1.70) already worked in forced VGA mode quite good. My mini review of the program:

Not really meant for photo viewing (it's the task of another app of the same firm, Aidem Photo Explorer, which will be discussed shortly) – e.g., no dedicated slideshow mode etc., but great as an image editor for small(er) images.

Pros:
- has no problems opening large images (downscales them)
- is able to create new images; max. size around 3-4 Mpixel.
- dithering, unlike most programs
- send via E-mail and IrDA
- tons of filters (Blur / Sharpen / Average / Despeckle / Diffuse / Emboss / Find Edge / Mosaic / Trace Countour / Cool Color / Warm Color)
- good adjustments (Brightness / Contrast / Hue / Saturation / Gamma)
- basic, common generic functions (flip / rotate, even with any degree, not just multipliers of 90), Rescale, Invert, Gray, Color Level.
- tons of editing capabilities (e.g., Gradient Tool; Water / Oil / Wax/ Carbon / Mick / Color Pen, Chalk etc.)
Cons:
- only saves large images downscaled with the factor of 3.5

Incidentally, the firm has also just come out with their other, digicam/slideshow-user-oriented app as well, Aidem Photo Explorer 2.0 ( http://www.aidem.com.tw/English/en_photoexplorer.htm ), which is also worth checking out. A quick review:

14 Mpixel thumbnail reading speed: 4:18 (average). Loaded the 6.6 Mbyte, 14 Mpixel image in 3-4 secs (very good, if not the best!).

Pros:
- excellent shrinking quality, unlike with most other apps
- excellent speed
- annotations are stored in the original image directory in the standardized format, unlike with most other apps
- 18 transition effects
- slideshow is able to synchronize with sound files, to wait for their end, unlike with most other apps
- integration with Aidem Pocket Painter to do the non-viewing (that is, editing) stuff. Editing done in Aidem Pocket Painter, however, don't see at once in Photo Explorer – the image must be saved from Pocket Painter and reloaded into Pocket Explorer.
Cons:
- problems in GIF slideshow with some (e.g., the Zoom) transition effects: only displays them in the left upper quarter screen; the other screen areas are filled with static
- no quick delete. (Not a serious problem – you'll hardly display GIF slideshows. JPG slideshows aren't affected by this bug.)
- even a bit of zooming results in pixelizated images (a tradeoff of very fast JPG decoding / loading)
- while rendering the thumbnails, it's totally unable to open any images – in this respect, it's even worse than XnView. Fortunately, it only renders a page of thumbnails: after rendering them, it again responds.
- no EXIF support

Verdict: not bad, especially if you use it together with Aidem Pocket Painter. Then, it becomes a very good, albeit a bit expensive tool.

[Highl1]

does it have "save for web" like feature?

cause i need some kind of program, coz i have only 128cf on my digital camera :) and some program to compress my images and save on ppc when i am not near home

[Menneisyys]

does it have "save for web" like feature?

cause i need some kind of program, coz i have only 128cf on my digital camera :) and some program to compress my images and save on ppc when i am not near home

Only Spb Imageer is able to upload directly to the Web, and only Pocket Phojo (which may be a "bit" expensive) contain a built-in FTP client. However, you can always use an external FTP client to optimize bandwidth usage. Furthermore, almost all image viewer programs contain emailing capabilities. Of course, it shoudl be stressed that seding e-mails with binary contents are always about 30% more bandwidth-consuming than via FTP/HTTP, so you may want to prefer HTTP/FTP upload.

Check out http://menneisyys.freeweb.hu/PICVIEWERS/ for more info on this (and any other, regarding image viewers) subject.