Kodak PictureCenter is one of many online services for storing photos and sending them to friends. Like many others, it only displays images at ridiculously low resolutions, and only lets you download images at 768×576, at best. If you want better quality photos, you have to buy them.

No thanks. Here’s how to get the full-size images from PictureCenter.

1. Go to the PictureCenter page for an album. (You should have received an email with a link to this page.)

2. Click on the ‘View’ tab, and click on a picture.

3. Right-click on the picture, and select ‘View Image’.

4. The URL in your browser should look something like this: http://picturecenter.kodak.com/imagep/2239126934_400.jpg?...

5. See the number before .jpg? Change it to 999999. The URL should now look like this: http://picturecenter.kodak.com/imagep/2239126934_999999.jpg?...

6. Voila! Right-click and save, and you have the picture in its original size.

Evidently, PictureCenter can display images at any size. The size is encoded in the URL, so we just ask for a size that’s almost certainly larger than the picture, and PictureCenter shows the image at its original size.

If I find out how to do this with other photo sites, I’ll post instructions here.