(EMAILWIRE.COM, April 26, 2001 ) Ofoto, Inc. (www.ofoto.com), the online photography service, announced April 26 that Doug White of Fishers, Indiana won Ofoto's "$10,000 Reasons to Smile," a national photo contest for the best picture of a smile. From the 5,311 entries submitted, White won the $10,000 grand prize for a film snapshot of his son who had jumped into a large bucket to cool off. Michele Yurgaitis of Enfield, Connecticut came in second with a digital photograph of her son in a tub with a shampoo bubble-head and beard and won a Canon PowerShot S100 Elph digital camera. Clovis, California resident Carolyn De Anda's photograph of her friend's child driving a tractor took third prize, winning her a sterling silver 5 x 7" picture frame. All winning photos are featured on the Ofoto Web site at www.ofoto.com/smile.

Noted San Francisco-based photographer Jock McDonald judged the contest using criteria of both the smile in the photos and the picture's ability to make him smile. "It was very difficult to judge," McDonald said. "I was impressed by the quality of the pictures - there was some real creativity."

McDonald said he chose De Anda's photo as one of the winners because "the subtle details on the photograph are great, like how one hand is on the steering wheel and the other is on the shift. And the coloring is just wonderful."

De Anda said that she was "so happy to hear that I was one of the winners" when she received notification. "I'm going to surprise the boy's mother with the frame and tell her that it's now official that her son has one of the best smiles," she said.

De Anda added that she "loves to photograph people, and this boy had such a happy face. I took a series of pictures of him - on his grampa's tractor, in a wheelbarrow with hay, on horses - and all the shots came out beautifully."

De Anda also noted that she uses Ofoto for both digital and film, and that she scanned and handpainted the photograph for the contest.

"$10,000 Reasons to Smile" was open to all members of Ofoto - both digital camera and film camera enthusiasts - and ran from February 28 through March 28, 2001. It was the first large-scale photo contest by Ofoto to offer a cash grand prize.

About Ofoto, Inc.

Ofoto, Inc. (www.ofoto.com) is an online photography service offering digital and film processing, top quality prints, private online image storing and sharing, editing and creative tools and frames, cards and other merchandise. Founded in July 1999, Ofoto runs its own state-of-the-art digital-photo lab and offers 24-hour customer support. Ofoto also prints for partners such as Amazon.com, Corbis, Excite@Home, Getty Images, HP, Intel, PhotosToGo and Sony's ImageStation. Based in Emeryville, California, Ofoto is run by an experienced team of owner-managers and is a privately held company with funding from Apple Computer, The Barksdale Group, Benchmark Capital Partners, HP, Index Ventures and the Rosewood Venture Group.

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Produced for Ofoto, Inc.

Contact:

Cameron C. Brown
Dir., Corporate Communications
510-229-1212
cameron@ofoto.com

Jeremy Pepper
Robin West
Manager, Public Relations
510-229-1270
jpepper@ofoto.com



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Ofoto, Inc.
Joseph Nchor
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