I’ve had some recent changes to my computer system that I had shared about recently in posts and thought I’d provide a little update on the matter. One of the issues was with Gmail not displaying images in messages, even though I’d told it to, and Xobni having a new release version available.

I wrote awhile back about Gmail not displaying images in my email messages, even though I’d told it to specifically always do so from specific senders. I had written this back in November of 2008 and up until now had continued to have issues. Recently I noticed that I was once again seeing graphics and now I don’t believe I’ve been having anymore issues. There was talk in the comments on the original post that it could be due to some Google Labs issues, but I never was able to confirm or fix anything there. Is everyone else noticing images again? Any ideas of what it was?

Also I’ve been a huge fan of Xobni since I first found out about it. I think it adds some great tools and features to Outlook that don’t exist. They continue to develop and improve the tool and expand the features. My problem though is it still brings my machine to a sluggish pace that’s just not acceptable. Honestly, part of the problem is probably with my machine. Pushing 4 years old and I put it through the wringer in my daily use. I uninstalled Xobni from my laptop, but when I get a new machine, Xobni will be one of the apps I’ll immediately reinstall and give it a try again.

It wasn’t too long ago that I posted an article about having issues with Gmail’s image display settings. There’s a great function where you can tell Gmail to always display images from certain senders. At least it would be a great setting if it worked.

Reading through the comments from my earlier post on this Gmail image issue there are a number of other people experiencing the same challenge. I’m sad they’re going through this too, but it’s good to know it’s not something just unique to my system.

Reposting this to hopefully get a solution from someone out there if you have one. Just leave a comment. I’ve continued looking but still haven’t found anything that makes a difference. I’ve been disabling and re-enabling extensions to see if that might be the culprit, but I haven’t had any success. That makes sense as well since I haven’t made any changes along those lines since everything seemed to be working fine.

Earlier commenter said it may be a Google Labs issue. That would be annoying that one of Google’s own apps is causing the problem. Then they’d start sounding a lot like Microsoft does sometimes!

I tried Pixelmator before but didn’t really use it much ever since. Probably, because I never really had enough time to play with it. The makers of Pixelmator recently released a new version and a new learning section in their web site which aims to teach and showcase the powerful editor that Pixelmator has become.

Bokeh Effect Image created with Pixelmator

The Colorful Bokeh Effect tutorial was the one that caught my interest. I like these types of images and saw it as a great opportunity to learn how to create one. So I downloaded a copy of Pixelmator again since the last copy I downloaded was an older version and the trial had expired. After installing it I proceeded with the tutorials. I honestly thought that it would take longer but I was over and done in less than 10 mins. It’s really easy in Pixelmator.

Not only was I surprised at how easy it was to do the image but the quality of the resulting image was great. For this tutorial I got to use the gradient tool. All I can say is that the gradient tool was great because you can see a live preview of the gradient you’re creating. Pixelmator makes use of the Macs GPU and produces quick filters and tools.

For $59 bucks, Pixelmator is a great buy. It has most of the features that everyday people will use. Sure Photoshop is still better but it also comes at a price. Most people won’t need that. Pixelmator makes it affordable for people to start and improve their image editing skills.

I would seriosuly recommend this app.

One of the things that continually frustrates me is when people decide they want to share the photos from their recent vacation with you. They send an email to everyone in their address book (in the To:) field and attach as many photos as they can in their e-mail program at the standard resolution provided by their digital camera of choice.

Let’s talk about the size difference of these photos.

Reviewing Image Properties in Windows

In the example image above the attached photo would be almost 2.5MB for a single photo. I’m not sure what the limits are in most email programs or what the restrictions are by ISP’s, but this is a chunk of file weight to be flying around the Internet.

Take a moment and resize your images before sharing them with family and friends. You can use tools within Windows, or my preference for quick, dirty and FREE resizing is IrfanView. (I wrote recently about my Favorite Graphics Programs here.) There’s also a nice Windows PowerToy utility Image Resizer that also makes it very easy for casual computer users.

Let’s look at the difference that can be achieved with resizing and resampling a picture that’s better for appropriate sharing via e-mail.

Copyright 2009 - Jason Bean

The image above has been resized to 500 x 375 pixels dimensions and to 81.5kb in size. As you can see the quality is still good and anyone reviewing  the photos should be able to get the full enjoyment of the photo. On the other hand the original image is 3072 x 2074 pixels dimensions and the 2.41MB in size. That’s a reduction of more than 95% of the original size of the file, while still maintaining a high quality view of the image for your friends and family.

Of course the other option would be to not send anything through email and instead share your photos on a variety of free photo sharing sites that are available like flickr, Picasa, Photrade, Windows Live Gallery and many others.