dare13

Would something like working on single layer have same effect;Blur the image, and than fade the blur using fade effect adding vivid light or similar blending mode.

Most of image editing programs have cropping functions; even freehand tool is quite often in free programs.Depending on why you crop images, do you use layers or effects you use program.Most best free one is Gimp; almost as same as Photoshop, and its free.

Looks good, nice color combination, and i really like menu effect when loading page.Can?t wait to see some content on your site.