Users Quickly Transform Original Images into Artistic Photos

PALO ALTO, Calif. -- Sept. 6 -- Light Crafts, creator of LightZone photo-editing software, today announced general availability of LightZone version 3.1. The release includes new capabilities for quickly changing the look of objects within a photograph, determined by color or luminosity. With a single operation, users can now change the exposure of the sky in an image, sharpen only the yellow flowers in a field or quickly modify the exposure of a face. This version further extends the selective editing capabilities of LightZone so that users can rapidly edit portions of photographs without altering surrounding details.

"With this release, Light Crafts continues to liberate digital photo-editing users from the tedious technology-focused approach to editing, allowing them instead to focus on the art of image creation," said Georges van Hoegaerden, Chief Executive Officer of Light Crafts.

The advancements in image processing capabilities of LightZone 3.1 build on Light Crafts' commitment to simplify photo-editing for photographers of all levels. With LightZone 3.1, users can easily employ color-based selections. Color and luminosity selections can be applied to every LightZone Tool and be combined (and saved) with an unlimited number of regions in a photograph.

The enhancements in LightZone 3.1 include:

• Color and luminosity-based selections;

• More Intelligent Styles for quick experimentation;

• Enhanced relight tool; and,

• Improved crop and rotate capability.

"Light Crafts will continue to redefine the digital photo-editing experience by delivering dramatic new ways of improving image quality and supporting creative expression in photography," said van Hoegaerden.

IDC reports 29.8 million digital cameras were sold in the U.S. in 2006 with projected sales of 30 million in 2007. The proliferation of digital cameras has dramatically increased the quantity of pictures taken over the past 10 years. According to CIPA, dSLR sales grew by more than 60 percent worldwide in the first half of 2007. This increased interest in photographs represents strong demand for an easy way to edit photos. LightZone allows photographers, novice and accomplished alike, to focus their time on shooting, rather than editing.

Light Crafts offers an innovative technology that is changing the way people think about photo-editing by providing an easy and affordable way for consumers to improve their photographs. Other editing tools, such as Adobe Photoshop, are based on a complicated mathematical language that can be difficult to navigate. With LightZone, users edit photographs visually and truly capture what they saw.

The improvements in LightZone 3.1 are available as a free download for existing LightZone 3.0 Full and Basic users. LightZone 3.1 is available for purchase and download at http://www.lightcrafts.com. The price is $249.95 for the Full version. LightZone Full is a premium quality standalone photo-editor with digital asset management and batch processing capabilities. LightZone Basic is a single image photo-editor used to dramatically enhance editing capabilities of other digital asset managers.