9. How can I upload images from my Digital Camera?
10. Can I print scanned images?
11. Can I print images from my cam-corder?
12. Can I print from my "Image to Floppy"?
13. Can I print gray scale images (Black & White)?
14. Are GIF files good enough to be printed?
15. What Print size and Print finishing option can I select?
16. What is the average time needed to upload an image to the lab chosen?

9. How can I upload images from my Digital Camera?
Your Digital Camera is supplied with software that enables you to transfer the Photos from the camera to the PC. While you are doing this transfer, make sure that you select JPEG or FLASHPIX file format. Note: today very few Digital Cameras support the FLASHPIX file format, but it is expected that this situation will change. Saving such format on your disk will do the job.

10. Can I print scanned images?
A scanner is an excellent source of digital images. The only thing you should keep on mind is to scan with enough resolution to match our new type of color printing technology. However, we do not want to let you scan in too high resolution, which will put you in a situation where the file is too large and therefore will occupy a lot of your disk space and will take too much time to be transferred over your modem. A good habit is to try to get a file with a resolution between 800 x 600 and 1024 x 768. This will give you a trade-off between quality, disk space and modem transmission time. Select TIFF Color 24 bit or JPEG as the file format to save. We do not expect that your scanner already support FLASHPIX. If it is the case, do not hesitate, choose FLASHPIX as this will be probably the most appropriate file format for photographic electronic data.

11. Can I print images from my cam-corder?
Logitech and Play offer a device called SNAPPY. We have tested this device with Cam-corder and made prints out of them. We should say that the Print quality we have obtained using a HI-8 Cam-corder is outstanding. Using the application supplied with SNAPPY, we recommend selecting a 800 x 600 resolution, and saving the file using JPEG file format. The MOTOPHOTO PICTUREWIRE application will be able to collect such images and upload them

12. Can I print from my "Image to Floppy"?
Yes: We have tested different "Image to Floppy" supplier, and tried to upload them with the MOTOPHOTO PICTUREWIRE application. For a few of them, a warning mention popped out in the screen, but for most of them, when bypassing the warning we got an acceptable quality print. But, the selected print size should not be larger than 4" x 6" (10 x 15 cm).

13. Can I print gray scale images (Black & White)?
Today, the MOTOPHOTO PICTUREWIRE application enables to collect a gray scale image. But when such an image is printed on traditional Colour Paper, it is extremely difficult to keep the grays, without any colour shift. In most of our attempts, even within the same lab, we always got prints that are not gray anymore, but had a shift in one of the basic colours.

14. Are GIF files good enough to be printed?
The GIF file format is widely used for Digital Images, but we should all remember that all GIF images are limited to 256 colours (often called 256 colour palette). Beside its limited number of colours, GIF is a format that is compressed (without any losses), and therefore, its characteristics are such that for screen display (that still often are limited to 256 colours too), GIF is a very appropriate format because files are small. This is one of the reasons that GIF is one of the standard formats used over the INTERNET. But, if you try to upload and print a GIF originated file (i.e. after converted the file from GIF to JPEG), you will have poor results as per the lack of number of colours. It may look attractive on a 256 colours computer screen, but it will not be adequate on photographic paper.

Today, the MOTOPHOTO PICTUREWIRE application is not able to check if the image was originally created from a GIF file and then converted to JPEG (or any other format supported), but we are working on this problem, in order to be able to issue a warning if the image you select is failing in such case. This will be offered in the next release.

15. What Print size and Print finishing option can I select?
The MOTOPHOTO PICTUREWIRE application lets you select the number of prints, the size and the finishing you want. This information will be listed and be totally dependent on the MotoPhoto store you choose.

16. What is the average time needed to upload an image to the lab chosen?
We hate to answer "It depends", but that has to be the answer.
Indeed, there are several issues here, starting with the modem speed you are using, and the size file you are sending. The simple rule is, use a fast modem and compress your file. We have made experiments in this area and have found that there is not much difference in the print between the same image of size 61K or 300K!
Another issue has to do with the Internet Service Provider (ISP) you are using and the load that this ISP has to cope with when you are online. Here it is difficult to tell you how much time the upload takes but in normal conditions we have found the following:
A 640 x 480 picture of size 41K with a 14'400 baud connection took 28 seconds
A 640 x 480 picture of size 41K with a 28'800 baud connection took 14 seconds
A 858 x 614 picture of size 61K with a 14'400 baud connection took 42 seconds
A 858 x 614 picture of size 61K with a 28'800 baud connection took 21 seconds
A 1536 x 1024 picture of size 161K with a 14'400 baud connection took 1 minute 52 seconds
A 1536 x 1024 picture of size 161K with a 28'800 baud connection took 56 seconds