Google fully consumes Picnik

[delpart]

Found the ties to Picassa interesting and now notice that Google just opted to consume it completely. Yet another question to ask and probably get the non-disclosure speech on again ...

On a side note, I did find the speed of the tools impressive etc. Some of the text methods were nifty as well (layer could be edited and such) The service is/was obviously limiting in some fashion, and all that. Just wanted to note the speed and a few other distinctions of some things was noteworthy.

Again, someone comparing this to PDN, so I figred it was worth noting for anyone who may re-direct or have it bookmarked for a specific effect or need.

Current homepage splash on their site:

"Take heed! Picnik is closing this April!


Picnik is moving its easy yet powerful photo editing tools to Google+. But Picnik doesn't end until our last day of April 19, 2012.

So in the meantime enjoy all of the Picnik features, including Picnik Premium, for free!



Get started now!


Fix your photos in just one click
Crop, resize, and rotate in real-time
Use advanced controls to fine-tune your results
Tons of special effects, from artsy to fun
Super fast, right in your browser - nothing to download or install
Basketfuls of shapes from hand-picked designers
Works on Mac, Windows, and Linux


All this for free - and as a parting gift Picnik Premium features are now free too!"

[TheBad1]

I'd never used it, but it looks pretty cool.

Does that mean all the features are free on Google + too ?

(Which I must start using one day, despite having it since Ash's kind giving an invite to ... !)

[delpart]

As yet to be determined what the service will become after they shut down the Picnik site. I made the call and got the answer I expected: "Probably just extensions to Picassa like currently integrated with a potential for an alternative Cloud based application alternative like the current version under a new name and without all that silly UI fluff ..."

Since this was phrased as speculation I feel its safe to share it here abouts. Nothing is ever set in stone with the fluidity of these projects over in Google land of course. That and I've learned too often that there is never one answer to this sort of thing, Google or otherwise, when it comes to full acquisition.

The main draw of the premium was usually just getting more tools and gizmos to work with from what I could determine. The only reason I even knew they existed though was thanks to the first Picassa integration and nod from Google when they first started working together ...

Google+ is the new direction for the account management overall under the hood it seems. Its not entirely necessary to commit to the +1 service and circles idea, but should allow easier access to the storage and tools to make it far easier in the future for email etc. I'm still trying to figure out how they are going to convince people its more than Facebook when they only discuss the social thing ...

Maybe I'm just not as social as I could be, but since helping on Tribes many years ago (RIP web 1.0 more or less) I've not found the "need" for these services to either keep me connected to people or offering anything more than distraction and commercial conduit. At least with Google you're not talking about trying to create an entire Internet ecosystem that is somehow "separate" from the rest of the web ... but couldn't exist without it, like Facebook did.

[Sargon III]

It is really great, but I had never used it or heard about it before
I am not sure what free meant to be, I went over the terms and conditions and uses, but didn't read all of them because they are too many, I really like the Stickers menu under Edit tab, there are so many cool shapes, wonder if it is possible to use them as brushes without violating the copyrights, they are in very good quality.
Thanks del for the link.

[Goonfella]

Not too interested really. Thanks for the link though Del. Now if it was a `proper' program with all the bells and whistles that they were giving away for free I would have downloaded it !

I`ve tried a few online image editors but never really got on with them. I prefer to have it on the laptop . At least then if you are in the middle of an image and the internet goes down you can carry on with it, unlike with an online one where all is lost until the connection comes back.

That is why I think all of this talk about the cloud taking over and everyone not needing to keep programs locally anymore is just tosh. Yes the cloud has it`s uses, like for keeping photos , documents etc. But it will never take over in the way the press seem to think it will. A combination of the two will always be the way to go , not one or the other. After all , where would PDN be if everything was in the cloud?

[delpart]

(Sort of random thoughts on Cloud computing in relation to the near future and minor advantages a happy blend can provide. Not a retort as it does boil down to "I agree this is all tosh until many many things change"_

@gf: Yeah, its one of many it seems. Sumopaint is far more layer friendly etc for a comparative cloud editor ...

On the idea of cloud computing though, there are potential advantages that are slowly being realized. While the power users will never go willingly. And those who can afford the hardware to compete against these ...

Overall though, there is some potential applications of cloud based blends for power users that may interest you. Or conversely the concept of having them potentially all in the cloud that could be a real shift in what you can do.

The example that comes to mind would be taking advantage of servers to do large scale rendering jobs. Sure. In your own home you can run your own cluster or server farm to get something like Blender to take minutes what it currently would output in hours ... However, if you could tap into all the downtime cycles of various clouds right now, you might change your work flow accordingly. This is more or less what has happened for a lot of people with other more simplistic applications ... Not everyone can manage their email as they go from one machine to another, but they all know how to login to GMail ...

My understanding is that you can rent for pennies on the hour time to get blender to render up your stuff right now if you're willing to invest the time into packaging it. No direct "click here to load your files" service that I'm aware of. But Blender's network rendering looks like it could be adapted to Amazon's cloud service. Cheap massive parallel computing. And its getting cheaper by the hour as it were.

The problem we all face though is where the people with the money making to decisions are steering all of it. I for one dont want to buy an Ipad device to do what I like to do, but there are tons of people (a vast majority) that are just extremely happy with the simplicity of not managing anything but their own content and passwords in the ether ...

Last 1/2 of the ramble: PDN for many could benefit from a cloud interface if it took advantage of some serious server power. Especially for large canvas work. Frankly without a ton of cores on this machine I'm milking the life out of, things like splinter blur, etc are painfully slow. Large image composition is nearly impossible due to memory constraints. And a few other nuances, like the constant stream of "where is that plugin supposed to be *wink*" ... But again, the power user would have the offline capability and capacity while others who would never touch it could find an easy and powerful way to take advantage of the software.

And then I'm back to the idea of us all becoming dependent on this Utopian, ubiquitous Internet connection approach to everything. There's a ton of motivations on the back-end to move to this design, and sadly most are based on more monetary issues versus what people want. Even then, the people selling bandwidth want restrictions while at the same time are promoting the idea of being the conduits for this ... Confused? I keep yelling at some of the major backbone providers over making up their mind one way or the other. And we'll skip the cell phone service providers entirely ... that's just greed and they're trying to cash in on as much as they can from this idea.

We've seen shifts back and forth in this and I dont expect it to stop anytime soon. Companies want to control theft of software, offer expanded services, control branding conflicts and other things are starting to blur with the flood of open source software and strong user development (PDN being in that realm) that have a lot of people questioning the overall direction. I'm from the server world in many ways. Most people rarely need the horsepower and their profile information etc is better managed by the people running the servers. But it all depends on the environment.

[venicet]

I used piknic for a while and then it wasn't doing enough for me without paying for the extra, so I went searching and got PDN. I'm going to go use it for a bit with all the premium stuff free though! LOL thanks for the info delpart.