Category: Tools

Save Your Eyes with This Free Tool

Humans weren’t designed to look at TVs, computer monitors, and smartphones all day. Now that our lives tend to revolve around these devices, digital eye strain has become a widespread issue. Symptoms of digital eye strain include itchy/burning eyes, blurred vision, or even headaches after using a device.

As an IT professional, eye strain had become a daily occurrence for me. I believed if I could just soften the brightness or shift the color of the screen, my eyes wouldn’t feel so assaulted by it. I also found that my optimal monitor brightness changed throughout the day, depending on the brightness of the room. Messing with my monitor settings didn’t help, so I went looking for a software solution.

Enter F.lux

F.lux is a free, lightweight utility that can control the display “warmth”, and thereby brightness. Corporate site licenses are available for Windows machines, but they are only required if your IT admin wants to control the installation and settings. F.lux is available for Windows, Mac, Linux, iPhone/iPad, and Android. It can be used in one of two ways:

  • Enter your location and the type of lighting you have, and let f.lux adjust your display automatically throughout the day
  • Change the brightness or warmth of the display to a single comfortable setting that remains constant all day. This is what I do since I spend most of my screen time in a room with fluorescent lighting where the time of day does not affect my ambient brightness.

Using F.lux

For the purposes of this article, instructions and screenshots refer to the Windows version of the software. During installation, you will be asked for your location. This information will help f.lux determine the kind of natural light you get and what time it is where you are.

After installing F.lux, you will find it in your taskbar on the bottom-right of your screen. In this image, it is the icon immediately to the right of the arrow:

Screenshot of the taskbar, showing the f.lux icon location

Click the icon to open the tool. Here is how mine looks:

Screenshot showing the f.lux control window with a menu icon in the upper left.

Because I knew I wanted the same warmth/brightness all day, I simply dragged the white button on the slider until the display looked more comfortable to me. The other information on the screen would suggest that the time of day is involved in the settings, but if you look in the upper right, the status is “warm all the time.” This means my setting stays the same all day.

If you want your warmth/brightness to change by time of day, click the orange dot next to the Circadian response percentage. This will convert the single slider into three sliders that can be set independently:

Screenshot showing three sliders labeled daytime, sunset, and bedtime.

After setting the sliders, you can click in the circadian response area to get a time lapse 24-hour preview of how the display will change over the day. If it’s not what you’re looking for, try adjusting again.

The Menu

For most folks, that would be enough configuration to make a world of difference. If you would like to dig deeper and discover more adjustments. If you have smart lighting in your home, you will definitely want to check out the “options and smart lighting” section.

If you use dual monitors like I do, getting both monitors to change can be tricky. If you only have one monitor showing the change, go to Settings>System and try duplicating the monitor display or changing which monitor is primary. Often, changing one of these settings will trigger f.lux to make both displays the same. Afterward, you can revert the settings to the way you had them and both screens should remain matched.

Other Resources

While F.lux is a great tool and using it on all of your devices will definitely reduce eye strain, there are other steps you can take to reduce eye strain, such as wearing blue light blocking glasses. Cornell Cooperative Extension of Rensselaer County has put together a video and an article that offer additional strategies for reducing eye strain. What are your favorite methods for battling eye strain? Let us know in the comments!

Restore Your Precious Old Photos with This Free Tool

We have highlighted several artificial intelligence (AI) tools on this blog lately because it is being used to power so many emerging trends and tools. Many folks think of AI as a sort of substitute human, owing to the early days of automated telephone customer service up through the sophisticated Alexa/Siri/Google digital assistants, I’m sure movies like 2001: A Space Odyssey, Robocop, Terminator, Her, and so on, helped solidify this image. In fact, artificial intelligence can just be a really good algorithm that can learn from experience and patterns. Examples of AI without names or faces would be software that creates deep fake videos, creates images from text, or writes copy for you based on key points.

The tool we’d like to share today doesn’t have an exciting name or website, but what it can do seems like magic. It is so simple to use that there is zero learning curve. If you can attach something to an email, you can restore your photos. Intrigued? So was I.

GFP-GAN

This wonder tool is called GFP-GAN. You can either use the demo version at Baseten as I did, or you can download the code for free from GitHub. The demo page invites you to upload your own photo or choose one of their photos to restore. You are given the option to download the restored image.

I clicked on their image of Harriet Tubman and the cleaned-up version was so good I wondered if there had been manual intervention in the restoration:

Original and restored portrait images of Harriet Tubman in black and white side-by-side

Next, I tried my own photo from the 1970s:

Original image on left of slightly blurry Mom holding a baby with the restored image less blurry on the right

This is a less stunning transformation, but the restored version is definitely less blurry.

I didn’t have any really rough images to try, but in my research about the tool, I found an article demonstrating some really amazing restorations, as well as going into deep detail about how the tool works. Here is the one that made me sure I wanted to write about this tool:

Original photo of a woman's face is torn, creased and faded on the left, and the restoration on the right is crystal clear

The AI “looks” at the image to find patterns, and then fills in what it determines is most likely to fill in the damaged parts. Because the image I uploaded was just blurry instead of damaged, there wasn’t much to fix or fill in.

Would You Use GFP-GAN?

Do you have old photos you would like to restore, but don’t have the expertise or equipment to do it yourself? Professional photo restoration is expensive, but this free tool may be just what you need to clean up your treasured image collection. Have you tried the tool? We’d love to know how your restorations turned out. Let us know in the comments!

Meet Craiyon, the Powerful AI Who Creates Art on Demand

You may have heard of the many things that AI (artificial intelligence) can do. There are chat bots that can assist you with various tasks, and you may be familiar with Alexa and Siri, digital assistants who can help you with various tasks like giving directions and setting timers. We have even previously written about Rytr, a tool that can help you with your writing. Now there is a new type of AI that can create art by simply entering a keyword or two.

Craiyon, which was formerly known as Dall-E Mini, uses AI model drawing images to create images based on any prompt.

You can use a broad term. This is what it came up with when I entered “mountain hotel”:

Screenshot showing a Craiyon prompt field with "mountain hotel" entered and nine image options below.

Or you can get a little more specific. This is what it came up with when I entered “cat reading on the beach”:

Screenshot of a Craiyon prompt field with "cat reading on the beach" filled in with nine image options.

There are all sorts of fun things you can try, such as famous people, places, or food. Have you tried Craiyon? Let us know in the comments.

How to Remove the Background from an Image

After we wrote our post on using the browser tool remove.bg, we got some feedback about another great tool, as well as questions about how to remove image backgrounds using Canva and Word.

Another Browser-Based Tool

First, I’d like to talk about a suggestion we received for a background remover at Experte.com. This tool is simple and elegant while having fewer restrictions than other free browser-based background removers. If you are a webmaster, you may be interested in some of their other tools. I plan to write another post featuring the full suite of tools in the near future.

Microsoft Word/PowerPoint

Given how often we use images in Microsoft Word and PowerPoint, it would be great if there was a way to remove an image background without leaving that platform. Great news – there is! It’s not always very accurate, but Microsoft has built this functionality into their Office software. Tech-Talk wrote a great article about removing backgrounds using Office software to guide you through the process. Note that instructions for Office 2007 are different than later versions. Unfortunately, Google Docs does not have an equivalent tool onboard.

Canva

Canva is another popular image editing tool that we were asked about. While Canva does have a background remover available, it is a paid feature. If you have access, here is how to remove an image background:

  • Click on the image you want to edit.
  • In the toolbar above the editor, click Edit image.
  • From the side panel, click BG Remover.
  • Wait for the background to be processed.
  • To apply the changes, click Apply on the bottom of the side panel.

Even on a paid plan, you are limited to using this feature on 500 images every 24 hours.

Conclusion

Thanks to those readers who reached out with questions and suggestions about removing backgrounds from images. If you have any other feedback, please don’t hesitate to contact us.

Excel/G-Sheets Tips For All Users – From Novice To Expert

Getting Started

Learning new software can be intimidating. It’s hard to know where to start if you don’t have guidance from a tutorial or class. When you have a basic understanding of that software, you naturally start to wonder about what shortcuts or features may be available that you haven’t used yet. In that case, it is impossible to search for information on things you don’t know exist. How do you take it to the next level without skipping steps in between?

Another thing to consider when looking for instruction is how you prefer to learn. Some folks will check out a “for dummies” book from the library and read it cover to cover. Others prefer to stop by the library and get instruction in person or connect to a web training so they can ask questions. Yet another subset of folks would rather watch videos or read articles online to get their information without involving another person.

The Library Has You Covered

The library offers drop-in tech help and virtual classes, books, e-books, and DVDs about Excel and Google Sheets, and a fantastic resource full of articles, videos, and interactive learning opportunities called Tech-Talk. Let’s take a closer look at the kinds of Excel/Google Sheets help Tech-Talk offers. These links should log you in automatically. If not, or if you are signing up for a webinar, use the username eglibrary and password eglibrary.

This quick reference guide is handy for users of all levels. Here is a collection that includes all of their Excel content, with the most recent articles and videos first. When possible, their information about Excel also includes a section for achieving comparable results on Google Sheets.

For Beginners

For Intermediate and Advanced Users

Major Cool Factor

I have always found Excel useful for organizing and sorting basic information, but I never got fancy with it. Recently, I attended a Tech-Talk webinar about creating dashboards using Excel and I was really impressed. If you want a quick peek at what dashboards are and how they can enhance your data, check out this short video and article.

We Can All Use a Little Help

Whether you enjoy playing around in spreadsheets, use spreadsheets because you have to, or are forced to use spreadsheets under duress at work, everyone can benefit from the tips and tricks offered at Tech-Talk. Which sort of Excel user are you? Let us know in the comments.