The problem with geotagging is that the information can be read by anyone. If you upload a geotagged photo to the Internet then anyone with the ability to view the photo can check the location the photo was taken.

While that often is not a problem, some users may want to avoid this from happening because of privacy concerns. In addition, there is a chance that criminals exploit the photo information as well, either to find out that you are on holiday currently and not at home, or to locate you or the people on the photo in the world.

Geotag Security is a free software program for Windows that can remove geotags from photos. The program displays a simple wizard that walks the user through the removal of geotags in selected photos.

It starts with the selection of a folder that contains photos and images that should be processed by the software program.

The program scans the folder for images and displays the number of photos found, the files with secure geotags and the files with non-secure geotags that have been secured by Geotag Security. Subfolders are automatically included in the scan.

A log is displayed that displays scan and photo processing information. The log displays a list of all scans performed by the program.

The next window is only available for users who have purchased Geotag Security Pro. The commercial version can monitor folders for new photos to process them automatically.

Users who want to download Geotag Security can download the program at the developer website. (via)

FotoMix is a surprisingly lightweight and advanced photo manipulation software for the Windows operating system, that can do that, and more.

The program basically allows the user to mix background and foreground pictures to form new photos. Each picture that gets added to the program can be manipulated in several ways, with options to add effects for instance or text.

Here is how FotoMix works in detail. It all starts with a new project, and a blank screen. It is then possible to select a background, either from an available photo, an artifical background or make the background transparent. Artificial backgrounds are textures basically that can be loaded in the program.

Each selection displays its own set of manipulation options. Photos for instance can be resized, cropped, rotated, deformed or enhanced with effects.

photo manipulation

Effects vary and include blurring the image, or making it look like an oil painting, rock, old paper photo or negative. Several sliders are provided to fine tune the results further.

The foreground image is the second image for the photo mix. Only photos can be selected as the foreground photo. A similar set of image manipulation and enhancement options are provided.

photo

Basically all available options in the background menu are also available in the foreground screen combined. From image manipulations like resizing or erasing to color tolerance, deformations, image tuning and effects.

Composition brings the photos together. In the beginning, only the foreground image is shown on the screen. Why? Because its transparency is set to 0. Sliders on the left edge can be used to change the transparency level and other parameters, like edge and circle fades, moving the foreground image around, and adding text to the image.

fotomix

Touch up is the fourth and last editing tab of the program. Brushes are available here to manipulate the composition further. A total of five brushes are available, including a clone and blend brush, useful to fine tune the resulting image.

Finally, newly created images can be saved in various formats including jpg, png and gif.

FotoMix is a handy application for users who want to mix multiple images. The program is completely free but ad driven, and compatible with all recent 32-bit and 64-bit editions of the Microsoft Windows operating system.

Photos can be added by dragging and dropping them into the program interface or by using the file browser which offers a handy option to add all images located in a folder. Each photo is displayed with its name and size in the interface. The photo editing options are located in the right sidebar and allow a user to resize, convert, watermark or rename the photos that have been added.

Several presets are available in the resizing section that allow the user to resize the photos to match devices like iPods or iPhones but also websites like Twitter or Facebook. It is also possible to select a custom size for the images. The photo conversion supports the most common image formats that include jpg and png among others.

A few photo editing options can be changed in the program’s settings. This ranges from the opacity level of the watermarks to the compression level of the jpg images. Image Tuner (via Neowin) is a handy photo editing software that’s especially useful to batch process photos on the local computer system.

JPEG Snoop is a tiny portable software program that can analyze the ins and outs of any digital image that the user loads into it. Supported are various image formats including jpg, pdf, crw, dng, cr2, new, orf, pef, thm and even mov and avi.

The software program will display many information about the image in a text editor like interface. The interesting part for users who want to identify if an image has been manipulated is at the end. The program will compare the compression characteristics of the image and assign an assessment class to it in the end.

Four assessment classes are defined:

• Class 1 – Image is processed/edited
• Class 2 – Image has high probability of being processed/edited
• Class 3 – Image has high probability of being original — NOTE: Please see description below!
• Class 4 – Uncertain if processed or original

We mentioned earlier that JPEG Snoop is able to process video formats as well. It can analyze a single frame of a video that is loaded into the software. The program might be interesting for users who regularly need to analyze the ins and outs of images.

The digital photo software will automatically recognize new digital photos that get added to monitored directories on the computer system. This is an excellent way of monitoring the default locations that photos from the digital camera get synced in. All photos will be displayed by default in the interface as thumbnails. It is possible to enter a full screen view mode for images by double-clicking them. Other options that are accessible from the interface are image rotation and deletion.

Two interesting additional features of the photo software are photo groups and the extensive filters that are offered. Photos can be added to groups by the user. Groups can be created freely by the user to add photos to them. Possibilities include parties, holidays and basically anything that the user can think of.

The extensive filter list makes it possible to filter the digital photos in various ways including time, orientation, photo content, dominant colors, textual filters or location based. The detailed view contains some additional features like Flickr, Picasa or SmugMug upload capabilities, setting images as wallpapers or printing photos. All in all a very clever great looking photo software.

The developer website is no longer working, we have taken the liberty to upload the software to our servers from where you can download Photology.

Photos can be loaded into the main interface. Each photo is displayed as a thumbnail with its resolution and DPI next to it. Images can be rotated by 90% and the aspect orientation can be changed between landscape and portrait mode.

The most important option however is the ability to change the photo’s resolution in various formats from centimeters to inches. Since it is possible to batch load photos it is also possible to change the aspect of all those photos at once. This is efficient if all photos that have been loaded into the application have the same resolution.

Each photo can be easily cropped by reducing the sides of a rectangle. The photo cropping software is extremely easy to use. It can process hundreds of photos in a matter of seconds.

Importing new photos into the application can be done easily. The user can use the navigation pane on the top left side of the application to select folders that contain images from his hard drive or use the Import function to pick folders that way. Photos that get imported are automatically categorized and sorted. It is for example possible to browse the photos by year after importing them.

Some categories like the rating category are empty at the beginning and will be filled when the user begins rating photos in the library. One interesting category is to view the images by equipment model which would be really great for photographers who use different equipment for different purposes.

Other options include to view photos by copyright holders, software, exposure time, flash and about a dozen more categories.

Images can be viewed as thumbnails, image strips, slideshows, single images, flip-book like or on a map that is showing their geographic location. This photo software has so many functions that it is hard to keep an overview over all of them.

One feature that is missing are those basic image editing functions that most other image viewers posses. It is not possible to resize an image and save it on the computer afterwards.

Pictomio raises the bar for other image viewers with its beautiful interface and image viewing functions. It does lack behind in image editing options and suffers a little bit from the amount of functions and features the developers have packed into the interface.

There is another drawback. Beauty has its price and users who like Pictomio simply because of its looks will have to cope with a much higher computer memory consumption as in related image viewers.

Pictomia is available for Windows XP and Windows Vista in version 1.0 and as technology preview version 1.1 which includes the Pictgeo software add-on which adds geotagging to the photo viewer.

The photo software reads existing geo data from images and displays them in Google Maps which is integrated in the software. Geo data can be edited or added if none is available. This can be done by entering coordinates and altitude manually or with the use of Google Maps.

Google Maps can be used to locate the place the image was taken and that information can be added to the selected images. It is furthermore possible to synchronize geo data between images, for example between raw and jpg versions of the same image.

Geo data can also be imported from geo data files and track files can be synchronized as well. The software can search for and display images that have been taken in a radius around a selected location.

The data can be exported to Google Earth and uploaded or synchronized with locr.