FileMinimizer Pictures

Uploading images is to Net newbies what parallel parking is to new drivers: it takes a lot of trial and error to get it right. And Megabyte-size snapshots hog Facebook bandwidth. Fileminimizer Pictures 3 from Balesio is a free tool that promises to help solve both issues. It resizes image files by up to 98 percent without zipping and without sacrificing quality. Its Facebook Uploader Module also makes it easy to post your pictures on Facebook.

Fileminimizer's interface is businesslike but attractive, with subtle but effective use of color and highlighting to differentiate the various icons and controls. Most users should have no trouble getting started, beginning with the descriptive control icons: Open Files, Optimize Files, Pack and Go, and Search Files. If you get stuck, the Web-based Help file answers most common questions. We started by adding a 1MB image and selecting Standard Compression. Fileminimizer quickly resized the file to .11 MB, an impressive 87.8 percent reduction. The new image appeared smaller than the old one but still very large and, most important, equal in quality. The Upload to Facebook option was just as straightforward, triggering a series of log-in and permission pop-ups that let us easily post the image to our page. There's also an option to stay logged in to Fileminimizer. The Web/E-Mail Compression level reduced file size even more to .05 MB. We could click to e-mail or delete any file in the queue, too. Fileminimizer also worked well with batches of images. Using the Low/Print Compression option and The Pack and Go button, which automatically selects all images in a folder, it was just as easy to handle multiple images as it was a single image.

Fileminimizer Pictures 3 proved an easy and effective tool for resizing, posting, and sending images, but its special emphasis on uploading images to Facebook makes it particularly valuable. It's free, too, which makes it perfect for recommending to folks who need a little help with images.