Bellamax Announces Open Beta Release for UpShot

Powerful Photo Editing Tool Brings New Level of Simplicity to Photo Hobbyists

SAN FRANCISCO – February 21, 2006 – In conjunction with the Photo Marketing Association (PMA) show to be held in Orlando, Fla. Feb. 26 - March 1, Bellamax, Inc. (www.bellamax.com) today announced the open beta release of a new photo editing software tool, UpShot. UpShot is aimed at the consumer photo hobbyist market and leverages the Bellamax technology currently used in the professional photography market.

The development of UpShot was based on extensive research, which showed that current photo editing needs of the photo hobbyist are not being met by today's products. According to a recent survey ⁽¹⁾, fewer than 25 percent of consumers who use photo-editing software are completely satisfied with their current editing software. A complicated interface and steep learning curve were the primary factors for this dissatisfaction. Bellamax has designed UpShot to address these needs with Fast Fix - a one click automatic correction tool, an intuitive user interface, contextual explains and embedded tutorials to simplify editing.

"We are excited to bring this product to a market that demands a more effective solution. Fast Fix is close to nirvana for a one click solution to make all photos better, faster," said Julie Wainwright, president and chief executive officer, Bellamax. "The editing tools give users the control they need to produce professional-level photos. It's beautifully designed, it's easy to use, and it's fast."

Better Pictures, Faster

With Fast Fix, a state-of-the-art, one click automatic correction, UpShot combines deep editing tools, allowing hobbyists a full array of manual editing options. Fast Fix intelligently analyzes the photo and does segment correction for skin tone, sky, foliage and other "memory" colors to optimally enhance the photo. Most red eye is automatically removed with Fast Fix. Fast Fix produces consistently better results versus the auto correct solutions in competitive products, since others use a simplistic approach of balancing the lights and darks in an image, which can sometimes result in image degradation.

UpShot's editing tools allow hobbyists to make adjustments from cropping and straightening to more sophisticated enhancements like color, brightness and saturation adjustments. There is also a suite of cosmetic tools for correcting skin tones, blemishes and wrinkles, cloning and even a tool to whiten teeth and eyes.

Additionally, for easy sharing and printing of photos, UpShot will provide seamless integration to the most popular websites including Webshots, Flickr, Shutterfly, HP's Snapfish, SmugMug, Photobucket.com, ImageShack.us and others.

Amy McDonough, director of services at Webshots commented, "UpShot offers a fast and seamless way for our members to upload photos directly to Webshots from their photo editing tool. It is a great service for our members and we're pleased to be working with such an industry-leading partner."

Packed with features, UpShot provides an ideal photo editing experience resulting in professional-quality prints. Some highlights include:

• Fast Fix has proprietary technology that is a far superior solution vs. competitive auto corrections because it has scene recognition, memory colors and adaptive algorithms. Other products simply stretch the histogram or use a global color balance.
• Fast Fix can be applied to one image or hundreds with a single click.
• The interface is elegant and intuitive so that users don't need to re-learn the software each time.
• The product has extensive editing tools, including facial retouching, teeth and eye whitening, cloning and effects.
• Users can easily share, print or post their photos to the most popular photo sites.

Free Offer

UpShot will be distributed via the internet and offered free for the first three months of its release.

About Bellamax, Inc.

Bellamax, Inc. has created the photo processing industry's first high yield, fully automatic photo correction and enhancement software. Bellamax software represents the next generation in automatic photo enhancement technology by combining easy-to-use image editing tools with proprietary, sophisticated image processing and workflow techniques. Founded in 2000, Bellamax targets the professional, retail and hobbyist markets. The company is located in San Francisco.

^{(1) Internal statistically projectable survey conducted by Bellamax in 2005.}

Press Contact:
slawrence@bellamax.com