travis mattison Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 Well I'm not sure if this is the right place on this site to post this question but I'm wondering if anyone has any advice for what they feel is good quality, best bang for your buck, photo editting software? Everyone knows what Photoshop is it's name gets thrown around like Kleenex and Zerox but it is just a brand name or is it "the" software to have? I don't really have any image software and it would be fun to experiment with some really good software. I would like to be able to save my original photos but then also be able to have something that I can manipulate them with for fun. Adding stuff into the photos, changing colors, contrast, lighting, and what ever else that may be available in the software. I don't really know much about photoshop but it seems like there are different packages and uses for each package? Well any advice on what you think I should start out with would be appreciated. Thanks! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
william-porter Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 Sorry, Travis. Question has no answer. Depends on too many other questions. What do you mean by "best"? How much is a buck worth to you? I could give you one answer: The best software for the buck is the software that came with your camera. After all, you probably feel like you got it for free. (You didn't, of course, but I hope you know what I mean.) But beyond that, it's impossible to say. There are lots of programs out there. I have not used IrFanView, but I'm told it's good, and it's free. Google's Picasa is also free, and while its editing capabilities are pretty limited, they're very good for what they do; and as a file manager, it's excellent. If you want a lot of Photoshop's pixel-editing power for nothing, you could always try The Gimp. Apple iPhoto remains a very good consumer product and not too expensive. Bibble Pro isn't as pretty as iPhoto, but it's very powerful, and while it's not free, either, I think it doesn't cost much more than iPhoto and it's certainly not nearly as expensive as Photoshop or even Aperture or Lightroom or LightZone. Can't remember what SilkyPix costs. I think RawShooter Essentials may still have a free download available. (The company was bought by Adobe and some of its features were rolled into Lightroom, but I am pretty sure I was told just recently that the old free version is still available.) Lightcraft's LightZone has a reduced-price version that's $200 or less, I think. You could also by Adobe Photoshop Elements, which I think is now up to version 6, and which costs not much over $100. Apple Aperture and Adobe Lightroom both cost about $300 -- but both are also really good programs. At some point, you will also have to ask yourself what your time is worth. I think Lightroom is worth the $300. But I'm not recommending ANY of these packages, because there's a lot of personal "taste" involved. Go to the web sites, read the info, download demos of the programs that look most promising and try 'em out for yourself. Good luck. P.S. I use Lightroom for heavy lifting (most of my post-processing work), Picasa for managing exported jpegs (all duplicates) and for very light-duty editing of test photos that don't matter to me. I have Photoshop Elements but I seldom use it. And I keep flirting with the idea of adding Lightcrafts' idiosyncratic but brilliant LightZone to my arsenal, and when I do, I'll probably stop thinking about Photoshop at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bruce_margolis Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 Travis, I am sure you will get lots of opinions on this. Here's mine.... As a 'fun' software, CS3 is pretty expensive but you sure get a lot of tools to play with. On a more modest scale, PS Elements is pretty good bang for the buck. You give up a few toys, most noticeably curves, but you get a lot, too, especially for the modest price. One nice thing about PSE, you can upgrade to CS later if you outgrow the first one, and everything carries over. IMO, PSE is a great starter program but even this 'simplified' version can take a while to learn. http://www.adobe.com/ And for a free intro video for the new 6.0 version of PSE.... http://www.photoshopelementsuser.com/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ann_clancy6 Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 The above responses have some very good suggestions. PS is a very powerful piece of software; however, only about 20% really is valuable to most photographers. It is hard to say what you need and what you want. You might consider starting with some basic free pieces of software available and as you out grow them start exploring more powerful programs. Some programs have trial periods that can be downloaded that will give you the opportunity to explore the functions and get a feel for the available options. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed_Ingold Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 The most expensive tool is one that doesn't get the job done. Photoshop gets all the jobs done - I'm done shopping. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
travis mattison Posted October 8, 2007 Author Share Posted October 8, 2007 Thanks for some opinions. Like I said I really don't know much about what is available out there. I tried that Picasa and didn't think much of it. Can't do much with it but then again it was free. I tend to believe you get what you pay for. I have been curious about PS Elements but I will definitely check into the list of things that you briefly mentioned above. Thanks again and I look forward to seeing some more opinions on this : ) I wish I could be more specific about the use or tools I am looking for but to be honest I really don't know what I'm looking for. Something that has a lot of features and I can really get creative not just adjust contrast and brightness like it's a TV or computer monitor if you know what I mean. Well thanks again. Feel free to voice your opinion on the software that you like to use! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jacopo_brembati Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 My father's PhotoResampling and PhotoDenoising are nice products (not expensive).<br> You can try them downloading a demo version.<br><br> Jacopo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fanta Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 I would start with Elements and possibly upgrade to PS CS3 later on. If on a budget, I find Picture Window Pro to be terrific. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ellis_vener_photography Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 Best value (versatility wise) for the dollar? No question: Adobe Photoshop CS3. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bill_tuthill Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 I prefer GIMP, even though I paid for Photoshop CS2 and PaintShopPro 9. GIMP is free and has limitations, but checklists show that it is more fully featured than Elements. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterlyons Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 Take a class somewhere and buy PhotoShop at student pricing! :-) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
roger_smith4 Posted October 8, 2007 Share Posted October 8, 2007 I vote for Lightroom at student pricing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
godfrey Posted October 9, 2007 Share Posted October 9, 2007 Lightroom + Photoshop do it for me. If I didn't already have Photoshop CS2 when I purchased Lightroom, Photoshop Elements would do most of what I need in addition to Lightroom. G Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alan_ginman Posted October 9, 2007 Share Posted October 9, 2007 For me, Paintshop Pro is brilliant value. It costs a fraction of Photoshop but it does most of what what the more ezpensive programme does. Equally importantly, it works in a similar way, so if you see an article explaining techniques in Photoshop, you can generally do the same thing in Paintshop. The menus will have different names, but the principles are the same. For me, Photoshop is waaaay overated. I think there is a free trialversion of Paintshop, but I'm not 100% sure about that. regards Alan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brad_ Posted October 9, 2007 Share Posted October 9, 2007 IF you are Mac-based, then Lightroom and <a href= "http://pixelmator.com/">Pixelmator at $59</a> would be a great combo. Pixelmator is fresh, superfast employing Apple's Core Image technology, and is the image editing program to keep an eye on long-term... www.citysnaps.net Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
travis mattison Posted October 9, 2007 Author Share Posted October 9, 2007 Thanks again for all your help! Not Mac-based. I guess I assumed that most of these programs had versions for both Mac and PC. Well thanks and I'll check into the software that you guys have recommended! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
richsimmons Posted October 9, 2007 Share Posted October 9, 2007 alan mentioned Paint Shop Pro. You can download a demo at corel.com. It really is a very good program. Corel's Photo-paint is a very good program too, but you can't buy it without buying CorelDraw too, which is a very good illustration program, but you can get a demo of that too. I started with those, but now my flow is CS3/Lightroom. Also, Ulead has PhotoImpact, which I think has a demo too and does pretty much all of what PS does. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
travis mattison Posted October 9, 2007 Author Share Posted October 9, 2007 I was wondering if anyone was going to mention the Corel software. I was thinking about trying it and now that I know there is a free trial period I'll check that one out for sure. Thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bill_tuthill Posted October 9, 2007 Share Posted October 9, 2007 PaintShopPro is a lot easier to use than Photoshop, has a better user interface, and offers more convenient color correction dialogs. If you can live without full support for 16-bit color, CMYK, LAB, and so forth, I recommend it. Also if you work in JPEG not RAW, you can duplicate camera settings with PSP but not with Photoshop. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
corey_gardner1 Posted October 9, 2007 Share Posted October 9, 2007 One of the side benefits of Photoshop is the backend support that is available. The vast majority of tutorials in books and on web sites are written for Photoshop. You can also get actions easily on the web which can help speed up the learning process. This is worth a ton. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jay_hopkins Posted October 9, 2007 Share Posted October 9, 2007 Paint.NET, price is free, similar to PS. Jay Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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