Kodak launches the first Skype certified online photo sharing experience, helping people talk live to friends, family and colleagues around the world while viewing a shared photo album

LAS VEGAS, January 3 ― Eastman Kodak Company and Skype™, the global Internet communications company, announce the availability of the latest innovation in digital storytelling ― KODAK Photo Voice ― that combines live voice and online photo sharing. The beta version of KODAK Photo Voice, the first Skype certified online photo sharing experience, is now available as a free download at www.kodakgallery.com/photovoice .

“Today’s families and social networks are scattered around the globe. Staying connected through photo sharing remains an important element in maintaining closer personal relationships,” said Sandra Morris, general manager of Consumer Imaging Services at Kodak. “Traditional social gatherings that once took place around the radio, television or telephone are now happening around the computer, mobile phone or camera. KODAK Photo Voice marks the next step in this evolution.”

KODAK Photo Voice is a brand new way to relive memories, empowering two people to simultaneously view a customized slideshow, and to reminisce and react to each picture. Imagine if Grandma could see pictures from her grandson’s first day at school while he narrates every moment of the experience over Skype. Perhaps an old roommate could share detailed photos and recount stories of his new life in London, as his friend back home in California reacts to each picture.

“Our goal is to make technology easy to use and Skype is a simple Internet communications service that is changing the way people stay in touch,” said James Bilefield, vice president of business development for Skype. “The combination of Skype’s service and KODAK EASYSHARE Gallery’s photo sharing capabilities will make sharing memories even more simple and rewarding for consumers around the globe.”

After downloading KODAK Photo Voice and Skype, the host selects pictures from a KODAK EASYSHARE Gallery album or from their computer, quickly and easily compiles them into a KODAK Photo Voice presentation and “calls” a friend via Skype to watch the slideshow live. Hosts submit orders for prints and other merchandise that guests select through KODAK EASYSHARE Gallery and have them mailed directly to the guest’s home.

About Eastman Kodak Company

Kodak is the leader in helping people take, share, print and view images—for memories, for information, for business, and for entertainment. With sales of $13.5 billion in 2004, the company is committed to a digitally oriented growth strategy focused on four businesses: Digital & Film Imaging Systems—providing consumers, professionals and cinematographers with digital and traditional products and services; Health—supplying the medical and dental professions with traditional and digital imaging and information systems, IT solutions and services; Graphic Communications—providing customers with a range of solutions for prepress, traditional and digital printing, and document scanning and multi-vendor IT services; and Display & Components—supplying original equipment manufacturers with imaging sensors as well as intellectual property and materials for the organic light-emitting diode (OLED) and LCD display industries. More information about Kodak (NYSE: EK) is available at www.kodak.com .

About Skype

Skype is the world’s fastest-growing service for Internet communication, allowing people everywhere to make unlimited voice and video calls for free. Skype is available in 27 languages and is used in almost every country around the world. Skype generates revenue through its premium service offerings such as making and receiving calls to and from landline and mobile phones, as well as voicemail and call forwarding services. Skype also has a growing network of hardware and software partners. Skype is an eBay company (NASDAQ: EBAY). To learn more visit skype.com .

Delivers Speech at International Consumer Electronics Show

LAS VEGAS, Jan. 6 -- Just as consumer desires drove the evolution of photography during the past 125 years, today’s consumers are defining the rules that will drive the future of digital imaging, said Antonio M. Perez, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Eastman Kodak Company (NYSE: EK). It’s a future where all digital content is automatically identified, organized and instantly accessible anytime, anywhere.

In a keynote address today to attendees of the International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada, Perez reflected on the current state of the digital imaging industry and asserted that consumers want full ownership of and instant access to all their images and information in order to creatively tell their life stories. Yet, Perez noted, the imaging industry continues to make this a difficult proposition by adding complexity through the proliferation of stand-alone devices and rapidly changing, proprietary technology standards that confuse consumers.

“Digital products and services should not require our customers to be engineers or professional photographers, but rather, should inspire them to be artists and publishers as they capture the moments of their lives, as they see them, with intuitive ease,” said Perez.

Perez stated that, since the days of company founder George Eastman, Kodak has focused on unleashing the power of images through innovation and by making complex technology simple to use. Yet, today’s digital capture devices don’t enable consumers to take full advantage of the powerful capabilities offered by digital technology.

“Today’s digital cameras are dinosaurs, with the same basic architecture and functionality as the box Brownie camera that Kodak introduced more than one hundred years ago,” said Perez. “It’s a lens, shutter and something to capture the focused light. All the imaging industry has done is to replace silver with silicon. In the next era, we will design digital cameras from the ground up to take full advantage of the creative power that digital technology provides.”

“Consumers want the power to use their images to connect, create, preserve, entertain and inform,” said Perez. “To that end, Kodak is committed to reinventing the digital imaging experience by pretty much changing everything that defines photography today and bringing ease-of-use to the next level.”

Perez cited the following three Kodak technology platforms that are driving the company’s innovation efforts:

Kodak Perfect Touch Technology, that will automatically detect and fix, before the user knows it, common photographic flaws such as under-lit pictures, high contrast scenes, back-lit shadows and red-eye in both still and motion images.

Kodak’s e-finder technology, where all digital content is automatically given a unique identity, enabling users to instantly access any image or information they wish anytime, anywhere. This intelligent content technology would take metadata tagging to the next level by enabling organization of pictures based on GPS location, automatic scene classification (beach, birthday party, etc.), decade mapping, face recognition technology and more.

Kodak’s e-moment technology, an intelligent system where pictures have the ability to automatically recognize each other. So, without human instruction, a picture will use its metadata to find another picture with related data, and assemble into new groups based on how they relate to one another. For example, imagine being able to access every picture ever taken of your son or daughter at Christmas, whether it’s part of your collection or those of relatives and friends.

“Consumers own the future of digital imaging -- their pictures, their memories, their life’s data, the stories they can tell about their life,” said Perez. “But it’s no longer about just pictures or voice, data or text. It’s the future where information and imaging become one, and consumers can access the important images of their life anytime, anywhere.”

Achieving this vision, said Perez, will take intellectual property and brand strength, delivered through innovation, partnerships and consumer insights.

“Images are an integral part of our lives. We must enable people to share faster, seamlessly and much simpler than is possible today,” said Perez. “Without true partnerships across our industry this will not happen. We will disappoint consumers and will miss one of the greatest business opportunities of our time. One of our top priorities at Kodak is to build strong partnerships with other industry leaders to make this happen.”

Motorola Partnership

Ed Zander, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Motorola joined Perez during his speech to discuss the signing of a 10-year global product, cross-licensing and marketing alliance between Kodak and Motorola. The agreement brings together the world’s most recognized brand in digital imaging with the global leader in wireless communications in a partnership intended to fulfill the promise of mobile imaging for the benefit of consumers worldwide. (See related news release at: www.kodak.com)

Updated Kodak Brand Mark

Perez also unveiled the latest evolution of Kodak’s brand logo. This new look moves the Kodak name out of the traditional yellow box; giving it a more contemporary design, a streamlined rounded look and distinctive letters. This introduction is the latest step in the company’s broad brand transformation effort, which reflects the multi-industry, digital imaging leader Kodak has become.

About Eastman Kodak Company

Kodak is the world’s leading imaging innovator. With sales of $13.5 billion in 2004, the company is committed to a digitally oriented growth strategy focused on helping people better use meaningful images and information in their life and work. Consumers use Kodak’s system of digital and traditional image capture products and services to take, print and share their pictures anytime, anywhere; Businesses effectively communicate with customers worldwide using Kodak solutions for prepress, traditional and digital printing, and document scanning; Creative Professionals rely on Kodak technology to uniquely tell their story through moving or still images; and leading Healthcare organizations rely on Kodak’s innovative products, services and customized workflow solutions to help improve patient care and maximize efficiency and information sharing within and across their enterprise.

More information about Kodak (NYSE: EK) is available at www.kodak.com .

Professional Photographers Instrumental in Developing New Modular Software to Import, Manage, Develop, and Showcase Images

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Jan. 9, 2006 — Adobe Systems Incorporated (Nasdaq:ADBE) today introduced the public beta of Adobe® Lightroom™, an all-new digital imaging solution for professional photographers. With its modular, task-based and streamlined environment, Lightroom’s goal is to deliver a complete photography workflow. As Adobe collects more feedback from photographers, modules and feature sets will likely change, as customers decide on their popularity and priority within digital photography workflows. Initially available as a beta for Macintosh, Lightroom will later support both the Windows® and Macintosh platforms.

"We first showed an early version of Lightroom at the Adobe Ideas Conference in April 2005 to demonstrate a new streamlined digital photography experience, from capture to print," said Shantanu Narayen, president and chief operating officer of Adobe. "Today’s Lightroom Beta leverages Adobe’s renowned digital imaging innovation, in areas such as raw image processing, so that even in beta form photographers will find world class technology that complements Photoshop. We look forward to the feedback from the photography community as we refine the product over the next few months."

New Open Architecture Focuses on the Image

Lightroom Beta has been designed with a radical new user interface that puts the focus on what photographers really care about: the image. With just one click, the control panels and tools fade into the background in Lights-Out mode, allowing the image to take center stage. The innovative Identity Plate feature allows photographers to apply their own branding to the application and its output, so that it becomes their own personal gallery for showcasing work. Photographers also can rapidly scroll through hundreds of images and Quick One-to-One Zoom allows instant magnification of the finer points within the image.

"Lightroom defines the future workflow for the professional digital photographer," said Seth Resnick, a premier corporate, editorial and stock photographer. "It delivers exactly the functions photographers need to speed up their workflow in a way that was never before possible."

High-Quality Raw Processing

Leveraging industry-leading Adobe Camera Raw technology, Lightroom supports over 100 cameras and incorporates raw conversion into a single workflow experience. Adobe continues to advance the state of the art in raw processing, as evidenced by the new split-toning controls which create richer black and white images. This extends photographers’ creative control, providing new parameters for making adjustments and more freedom to address precise areas of the photograph on the histogram. Upon import, files can be converted to Digital Negative format (DNG) or renamed and segmented by folder or date.

Images can also be showcased via slideshows with drop shadows, borders, Identity Plates and different colored backgrounds. The size and position of the images can be manipulated and delivered in Macromedia Flash®, Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF) or HTML formats. A variety of templates are offered for contact sheets with the ability to add identity plates or produce a fine art print.

Pricing and Availability

The public debut of Lightroom Beta for Macintosh OSX 10.4.3 will occur at Macworld 2006 on January 10, 2006 in San Francisco at Booth #1307 and is available for free download from the Adobe Labs Web site at http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/lightroom . Recommended system requirements are Macintosh OSX 10.4.3, 1 GHz PowerPC G4 processor, 768 MB RAM and a 1024x768 resolution screen. Regular updates to the software will be posted on the site, feedback will be collected and the final product is expected to be introduced in late 2006. Further details around pricing, system requirements and availability have yet to be determined.

About Adobe Systems Incorporated

Adobe revolutionizes how the world engages with ideas and information - anytime, anywhere and through any medium. For more information, visit www.adobe.com .

Subscription-Based Stock Photography Agency Steps Up Expansion with its First Acquisition

Deal Coincides with Company Milestone: ShutterStock's Photo Library Hits 500,000 Images

"We're very excited about what this means for ShutterStock ," said CEO Jon Oringer. "With the assets of Photosights.com, we're able to offer ShutterStock clients, existing and new, an even stronger service than before."

The deal will accelerate the pace of growth for ShutterStock's photo library (the site already adds over 5,000 images each week) as images from Photosight.com are evaluated by ShutterStock screeners and, if accepted, posted to the site. Photosight.com's photographers are encouraged to resubmit their photos to ShutterStock immediately to expedite the approval process and begin earning money from ShutterStock customer downloads. Photographers who had 2,500 images or more on the now defunct site are eligible for a "fast track" acclimation to facilitate their transition to ShutterStock.

The deal is particularly newsworthy given how unusual it is for a company of ShutterStock's size to acquire the assets of a competitor. "ShutterStock's model seems to be working, and we will continue to act aggressively to improve our product, build our business, and increase our market share," said Oringer.

About ShutterStock (TM)
Founded in 2003, ShutterStock is one of the fastest growing suppliers of royalty-free stock photography in the industry. Its outstanding collection of premium images combined with a user-friendly subscription model has made ShutterStock a trusted resource for an expanding global customer base. ShutterStock currently has over 500,000 images available to its subscribers, a number that increases every day. ShutterStock is a trademark of ShutterStock, Inc. For more information, visit www.ShutterStock.com.

ShutterStock profile details on our agency database >>