Black and white is fine. But I'm looking for something (hopefully free) that'll help me create romantic pictures for my wife. The less I spend on the software, the more I can spend on those flowers she likes.

Well, it's good to see Savio's a romantic, and we have just the program for him. We recommend you take a look at 2 Pic from Moor Computer Products. This program takes two images (one on the left side and one on the right side), and performs a wide variety of effects, including blends and filters.

As a test, we took two pictures from our trusty clipart collection and opened them in 2 Pic, as shown in Figure A.

FIGURE A

We took a nice romantic sunset and a picture of a pretty woman. Click picture for a larger image.

As you can see in Figure A, there's a series of tabs along the bottom. We tried a bunch of effects, but the one that generated the most romantic feel was on the Fade tab. We chose Radial, then hit the Start button, as shown in Figure B.

FIGURE B

We'll do a radial fade Click picture for a larger image.

You can see the result in Figure C.

FIGURE C

We've created a very romantic picture. Click picture for a larger image.

We've created a very romantic picture in a very short time, using a free piece of software. Ain't the Internet grand?

For more than 20 years, David Gewirtz, the author of Where Have All The Emails Gone? and The Flexible Enterprise has analyzed current, historical, and emerging issues relating to technology, competitiveness, and policy. David is the Editor-in-Chief of the ZATZ magazines, is the Cyberterrorism Advisor for the International Association for Counterterrorism and Security Professionals, and can be reached via email at david@zatz.com.