Magic Potion

If you like your photomanipulation quick and dirty—or just need to tweak images on the fly—you'll love Rollip, a no-frills site that transforms uploaded images (jpegs, bmps, gifs, and pngs) with your choice of 40 effects. It's easy, fast, and, thanks to a smattering of unobtrusive banner ads, free. Tint your childhood photos a wistful sepia, impart an eerie glow to last Christmas, or warm up a cold city shot with the nostalgic tones of a faded Polaroid. Live it up with the "Styled Lenses" but for the sake of your memories, go easy on the "Extreme Stylized" effects.

New York City is celebrating Valentine's Day with the installation of a ten-foot-tall heart in Times Square. The cold caveat? It's constructed from masonry-scaled blocks of ice. Moorhead & Moorhead, the architectural and industrial design firm who created the public art project (with the help of structural engineers, lighting technicians, and a team of chainsaw-wiedling ice sculptors), are sharing the love online, with a web-based tool that allows users to create photo mosaic e-Valentines. Fill the virtual Ice Heart with your own photos or those selected automatically based on the Flickr tags of your choice, add a message, click "send," and prepare to melt the heart of that special someone.

"Ponoko" may sound like the latest adorable animated creature or addictive puzzle game to come out of Tokyo, but it's actually an online venture that aspires to be nothing less than the Flickr and YouTube of product design. The virtual marketplace brings together creators, digital fabricators, materials suppliers, and buyers to take part in what Ponoko's creators describe as "the world's easiest making system." The vast site allows users to design their own products (from jewelry and toys to furniture and lighting fixtures), price them for sale, and arrange for them to be produced locally, as close to the point of consumption as possible. Those less inclined to DIY can choose from among Ponoko's tens of thousands of user-generated product designs, all ready to be customized and made into real things with the click of a mouse.

Whether you're looking for a fresh forum to show off and sell your own identity design work or just curious as to what others are up to, check out StockLogos.com. The latest in a series of creative initiatives by WebMediaBrands (LiquidTreat's parent company), the online community was created as a source of creative, high-quality, and affordable logos. Those seeking to sell their logo designs can easily upload their work and price it for sale, while logo-seeking customers from around the world can browse and purchase designs posted to the site. Also welcome are design critics, who can rate each of the site's logos on a scale of one to five stars.

Those initiated to the world of Netflix, the twenty-first-century version of a video store, are familiar with the distinctive red and white envelopes in which the company's millions of DVDs are dispatched and returned. The residue of a Netflix transaction is the squarish paper flap that must be torn off the envelope before dropping it into a mailbox. But before you toss that flap into the recycling bin, click over to Netflix Origami, a site (unaffiliated with Netflix) that provides step-by-step instructions on transforming your humble Netflix flaps into folded paper creations such as swans, frogs, airplanes, and (deja vu!) envelopes. Want to impress that environmentally-conscious film buff this Valentine's Day? Go with the heart.

Scout and support emerging artists without leaving your desk. Affordable art is just a click away at CollegeArtOnline.com, which aims to bring art to the masses. The site offers a wealth of original student artwork at prices that range from $50 to $3,000 (the average sale is $200) and allows would-be collectors to pay the listed price or make the artist an offer. As for sifting through the available works, you can browse categories including paintings, photography, and sculpture, but we recommend checking out the site's "curated exhibitions," an ongoing series that features works selected by guest curators around themes such as simplicity and fate.