[d] enclosed in brackets chaotic perfectionist for hire

My wife's uncle has a Mac laptop, with a camera built in and Photobooth installed. If you haven't seen or heard about it, Photobooth allows you to take pictures with the camera, with added effects like warping and filters (black and white, sepia, etc). Very fun, and I was reminded of that while reading the Lifehacker article on documenting your party (so you don't have to miss it).

That prompted me to start looking for software to give me the same fun, but for Windows, and available offline for the times I can't be connected. That's not nearly as easy as it sounds, at least not without paying for it (which I don't want to do for many reasons). My first stop was Cameroid, which was great in the effects and filters. It's also free, and the only real drawback is that it's online only - not as much of a problem these days, but still a consideration. I took this picture with it, and it reminds me of the photos on Webmonkey (even if they're a different color scheme). It's pretty good stuff, and allows you to save the picture right away and/or share the link (very useful these days).

There are others to look at, like sigost (which only came up on one of three system I tried it with), Dr. Jekill (yes, spelled like that, and it's trialware), phozi (stamps and drawing more than visual effects), and photoboof (works like the old-school photo booths).

Ok, ok, the real reason to use it is to make goofy pictures. Here you go:

Happy now?

Here are some screen shots from browsershots.org.