PicWash Blog

Avoid Unflattering Photo Tags on Facebook

It happens to us all: we wake up one morning after a night of fun to open up Facebook and see a set of very unflattering photos of ourselves from the night before. Spinach in the teeth, sweaty forehead dancing the tango (where was that?). This can lead to some quick-thinking damage control to 'Untag' the photo and ask the culprit to delete it from his/her account. But possibly not before your friends and coworkers see it!

Facebook is the center of the social photo universe these days - with over 10B photos, there are 60 million potentially embarrasing pics uploaded each and every week. So it's only natural that some will worry about whether last night's party will end up broadcast to their 8 gazillion friends.

There are some useful tools to deal with this pesty occurence, and they are just a simple click away using Facebook's Privacy settings.

Option 1: SMS Phone notificatoin

Facebook can notify you via text message if somebody tags you in a photo or comments on one of your photos. Here's how to activate this in just a few simple steps:

1. Click Settings-->Account Settings from the top right side of the home page on Facebook.
2. Under Account Settings, select the Notifications Tab.
3. Under the Photos section, select the Notification options you want - check the SMS box to get a text message right when somebody does the following:
4. • Tags you in a Photo
   • Comments on your Photo

Option 2: Complete Stealth Mode

Some of us just don't want to be tagged - ever. That's not a problem! In fact, if you follow this mode, the only photos tied to your profile will be those that you upload yourself!

Facebook has a setting which will prevent it from linking any pictures tagged of you to your profile. Instead, your friends will only see photos that you added yourself, when they search for pictures of you.

1. Click Settings-->Privacy Settings from the top right side of the home page on Facebook.
2. Click the Profile link
3. Under the "Photos Tagged of Me" setting, click "Edit Custom Settings"
4. This will open a small window. Under Friends, select "Only Me".
5. Select Okay.

This will put you in a so-called Stealth Mode. Because only the photos that you upload yourself, and presumably approve of, will be linked to your profile.

The 6 Most Common Facebook Photos

We came across this article today from College Candy. They've put the 10 billion + photos on Facebook into 6 basic categories. We'd have to agree on their choices, and must admit that we too are guilty of some of these! How about you?

• The Flattering/Pretty Picture (see above)
• The Crop-Out-Everyone-Who-Looks-Bad Photo
• The Funny Drinking Photo
• The Artsy Photo
• The Look-At-Me Photo
• The Happy Couple Photo

Read the full article here!

Don't Make these 5 Wedding Photo Mistakes

Modern Bride's blog, Wedded Bits, has a great article with some tips on making sure your wedding photos look their best. PicWash is proud to be mentioned as a "genius" tool to help with wedding photos. We have helped lots of wedding and event photos to look their best!

Check out the article here.

Do you have photos from a wedding that you'd like our expert designers to retouch? Click here to submit them. Your photos will be ready in 48 hours.

Tip: Many users retouch photos of the bride/groom and wedding procession before sending them out. This will be much appreciated by the subjects in the photos. The wedding procession has lots of potentially tricky angles (e.g., back side of dresses, upper arms, the sweating groom :). There's nothing worse than sending unflattering photos of these beautiful events! Try the PicWash Slim or PicWash with Note for enhanced features. Learn about our 3 services here.

PicWash Launches new Updates and Features!

Our mission is to make PicWash the best, easy-to-use retouching website for your digital world. While our designers have been working around-the-clock on your pictures, our developers have been hard at work to bring you great new features and updates.

 

 

Today we are pleased to announce 3 significant updates to the site! These include:

 

- Picasa Button Functionality - Upload photos direct from Picasa Software

- Take a Picture from your Web Camera

- Buy 10 photos and get 3 additional photos free

 

 

Picasa Button

 

To help you easily upload photos, you can now add a PicWash button to your desktop Picasa software. To upload a photo to PicWash from Picasa, just click the PicWash button. It's the easiest way to get photos on to our site from your desktop software!

 

To add the Picasa button, log-in to PicWash and proceed to the upload page. You will see a link on the bottom left to install the Picasa button from there. (Note: Picasa must be installed on your computer in order for this to work. Click here to download Picasa.)

 

 

Take a Picture from your Web Camera

Do you want a great profile picture but just can't find the right one in your photo library? Now you can take a picture from your computer's Web Camera, and send it directly to our designers for some sprucing up! 

 

To take pictures from your Web Camera, simply select the Web Camera option on the upload page of your account. Taking pics is a snap and detailed instructions are listed on the page.

 

 

Buy 10 Photos, get 3 Free!

 

Our site is offering a special to help you retouch your photo albums. Simply upload a total of 13 photos, and 3 photos will be Free at check-out! That's a savings of up to 25% when you purchase 10 photos!

 

 

Users who upload their photo to PicWash will have their retouched version available in 48 hours or less. 

Happy Winter Days from PicWash!

 

 

Visit PicWash.com/ to Start Now.

http://www.PicWash.com/

The Psychology of Attractiveness - Beauty is like Candy!

Please see the link here for an interesting article about beauty and physical attractiveness, from Science News. Here's an interesting quote:

"Eye candy might more appropriately be called brain candy. Seeing a pretty face is like eating a piece of oh-so-sweet chocolate — for the brain, if not for the stomach. In fact, attractive faces activate the same reward circuitry in the brain as food, drugs and money. "

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/feature/id/39616/title/It%E2%80%99s_written_all_over_your_face

The Gospel of PicWash is Spreading!

We at PicWash were so excited when a user sent us a recent Magazine mention from Cosmopolitan magazine, this April 2008. We are not able to catch all of the press that we have been receiving, unfortunately, but we have been able to catch our recent mentions in Oprah Magazine, CNET, Good Housekeeping, Nylon, Quick and Simple, and more. Thank you to our thousands of dedicated users for keeping us in the loop! To check out some of our Press, click here.

It is really exciting to see our service getting press coverage - the gospel of PicWash is spreading!

Now we don't mean that this is some religious cult or anything, far from it!

But we do think that PicWash is such a great idea because it's a simple service that has super nice benefits.

Think about it - there's something like 80 billion pictures taken each year around the world.

Considering that there are around 6.6 billion people on earth, that's about 12 pictures per person per year.

Where do most people take their photos? At special events, of course! Birthday parties, weddings, party nights out with close friends and family.

These are the moments that really count, where you think "Gee whiz, I really would like to record this moment on camera."

So you get all dressed up, go out to party, and have a GREAT time!

The next day, you upload your photos to your computer. You ask yourself "Did I really look like that last night? Ewww!"

That's a normal reaction and it's not your fault, most people feel like that.

Why? One reason is that cameras these days are increasingly more complex. There are ever more pixels representing your face - things that even the human eye wouldn't notice end up showing up great on your 25th Birthday Party picture - the zit you didn't even see, that one tooth that looks a little more yellow than the others, the shininess of your face.

So what happens after you upload your photo to your favorite photo sharing site? You invite your friends to see it of course! They log on to view the photos from the great event, share it on their blogs, social networks, or their own photo albums.

Next thing you know, your photo is all over the cyber universe. Zits and all!

At PicWash, we love to party and hang out with our friends and loved ones. We also have the added confidence that our photos will come out super great, since they will be retouched by some really talented photo retouching artists! Before we share our pictures with the world we give our photos the VIP treatment.

Our mission is simple: We're putting an end to the photo-viewing blues. Because when you look good, you feel good.

PicWash Featured on CosmoGirl! Blog, The Daily Kiss!

We are so excited to have been featured on the CosmoGirl! Blog, The Daily Kiss, this week! Here's an excerpt of the article by Jenn, Senior Beauty and Fitness Editor:

"You know how everyone says celebrities look good in photos because they're airbrushed? Well, it's true! And now the rich and famous aren't the only ones who can get photo retouching. A new site just launched that takes any photo you have and makes you and your friends look better... and it doesn't even cost that much money! It's called PicWash.

And don't get all worried (like I did) that PicWash will turn you into an airbrushed robot that looks nothing like you... they just do the basic stuff that makes you a more beautiful you: mattify your shiny skin, fix red eyes, take away pimples and stray hairs, etc. And, I met with the owner last week and he told me actual humans do the retouching, and you can even send your retoucher a note with what to fix if you aren't happy with the results. Pretty cool, huh?"

Thanks to CosmoGirl.com for featuring our service!

To read the complete article, click here.