lumi — Wed, 06 Sep 2006 01:57:32 +0000

for normal pictures is PSP more than enough. Illistrator, PS etc are all too expensive and to high developed for such simple tasks. i use PSP 5 since some years and it's enough for the most of my needs, even to make animated GIF with the bundled Animation Shop.

lumi

Megan — Thu, 31 Aug 2006 15:08:30 +0000

Corel PhotoPaint: this isn't "low cost" but after the above discussion with Greg I decided to check it out. This is a good program. There are some weird usability issues but partly because they do some things very differently and not necessarily in a bad way. There are no selections - they work as masks. Layers are called "objects" (I was starting to freak because I couldn't find the layers palette. What??? They don't have layers??? They do, they're just called Objects). Some tools in here have more options than Photoshop. This isn't just another photoshop wannabe. They're totally doing their own thing here, which is good. Too bad about the bad marketing (and too bad it's only available on Windows).

photoshop250 — Thu, 31 Aug 2006 07:37:16 +0000

I would recommend using GIMP if you are on a tight budget its just as good as alot of the more expensive programs out there.

teammatt3 — Thu, 31 Aug 2006 02:46:04 +0000

Isn't ImageReady free? When you download the trial of PhotoShop, PhotoShop expires in 30 days, but you can still run ImageReady. I don't know if it was meant to be that way, but that's what I'm doing. It's almost as good as PS but it's free. My sister is a wedding photographer so if I do need to use PS I just use her laptop.

Greg K — Wed, 30 Aug 2006 20:48:28 +0000

That was a typo on my part, I ment that PhotoPaint can use the plug-ins. Corel Draw *is* vector based like Illustrator. Photopaint is raster like Photoshop. Sorry about the confusion.

-Greg

Megan — Wed, 30 Aug 2006 20:18:13 +0000

Greg K wrote: Well you have to remember, PhotoPaint is tied into the suite, where as PSP is a standalone app. It is to easier inport/export to/from corel draw. I'm not sure about PSP, but corel draw from what I remember (haven't messed with the feature since version 7) will use just about any plugin that photoshop can use, it is (or was) the closest compettion to Adobe Photoshop as far as how complex and the features.

Wait, wait, wait - isn't Corel Draw a vector program???? I'm seriously confused now! I guess that's another marketing problem if they've changed it to raster and people still think it's a vector program! Or do you mean that PhotoPaint was most comparable to Photoshop? That would make more sense.

Greg K — Wed, 30 Aug 2006 20:02:13 +0000

Megan wrote: PSP had a larger user base than PhotoPaint ever did so why not just ditch photo paint?

Well you have to remember, PhotoPaint is tied into the suite, where as PSP is a standalone app. It is to easier inport/export to/from corel draw. I'm not sure about PSP, but corel draw from what I remember (haven't messed with the feature since version 7) will use just about any plugin that photoshop can use, it is (or was) the closest compettion to Adobe Photoshop as far as how complex and the features. Who knows where it stacks up now. Corel has a serious marketing problem IMO. Look how many people say "what's word perfect"? (I still prefer this over Word).

Even though I have a full copy of PhotoImpact 10, I'm seriously thinking of uninstalling it and reinstalling version 6. I couldn't find my cd for version 6 at the time, and with a sale they had, the full copy was only $10 more than the upgrade, so I paid the $10. (plus the upgrade actaully requires the older copy to be installed, which sucks. Why load up my system with a program just to uninstall right away after insalling upgrade. but looks like i'm gonna do that reverse now.

-Greg

Megan — Wed, 30 Aug 2006 19:40:17 +0000

Greg K wrote: As for whats up with PSP, I imagine as the CorelDraw suite is Corel's big graphics program, with Draw for vectored/publishing and PhotoPaint for Bitmapped images, they would rather you buy that as a full graphics application than PSP, which could be why they market it as a photo editor now.

-Greg

Hmmm.... that makes a little more sense. But then, PSP had a larger user base than PhotoPaint ever did so why not just ditch photo paint? I've downloaded a trial version of that to check out. See how it stacks up on my comparison chart I don't ever recall hearing about anyone actually using PhotoPaint....

I'm with you on the old versions! Photoshop 5.5 is a good program - all the key features, not so much of of the bloat. My opinion is that in general people pay a lot of money for software features they'll never use. There would be a great market for "lite" versions of popular software with better usability and less bloat.

Greg K — Wed, 30 Aug 2006 15:36:28 +0000

Here's my 2cents worth, and if you have a coupon, you can get it for only a penny if you call in the next ten minutes! LOL

I started with PaintShop Pro back in 1996 when I first started using the internet and making pages.

I had a freind who used Corel Draw and knew it well, so I started using version 6, after about 20 hours of downloading it from the newsgroups on a 14.4 modem... Yes Bad. BUT I loved it so much that 2 months later I BOUGHT version 7. I mainly used that (Corel PhotoPaint which is in the suit) for web images. When I went back to college, I was able to get version 10 for student price so I got it. However, like many large suites, it got so bloated that it took forever to load.

I had heard many recomendations for Smart Saver Pro from Ulead. They were just about to come out with version 7 of Photo Impact, so they were selling the boxed version of 6 at discount, which qualified me for the upgrade price of SSP. Together the PI discount price, and the upgrade price of SSP, I got them both for only $10 more than buying the full version os SSP. Well I gave PI a try, and to my surpise it was much faster than Corel PhotoPaint. So I started learning it.

Later I bought the Macromedia Studio, and started learning fireworks. I switched to using this for advanced editing instead of Corel, but still used PI for quick things. I now have a faster laptop, and have upgraded to CorelDraw 12 and PI 10. However, again, with growath ome bloating...... Fireworks or PhotoPaint open just as fast so I use those once again.

But PhotoImpact is pretty nice for under $100 compared to $400 for the full Corel Draw suite, or fireworks for $300. Another thing to look for, software that is one version old (usually only found in full boxed versions). Ie. Corel Draw 12 you can get at buycom for $179 with free shippin compared to the current version for $400. For someone starting out, I doubt they would really find $220 worth of new features. Photoshop Elements 2.0 is only $25 online.

As for whats up with PSP, I imagine as the CorelDraw suite is Corel's big graphics program, with Draw for vectored/publishing and PhotoPaint for Bitmapped images, they would rather you buy that as a full graphics application than PSP, which could be why they market it as a photo editor now.

-Greg

Megan — Wed, 30 Aug 2006 12:53:57 +0000

roo wrote: Probablly because with Photoshop's last two upgrades they really did a lot for photographers. Really the only thing that they did for graphic design was text on a path and the new warp feature. Since Paint Shop Pro and especially now that it's owned by Corel is tries to compete with Adobe, I would guess that's why.

That's not really what I meant. I was talking about the masses - you know, the people who just bought a digital camera and want to remove red eye and stuff. PSP has a lot of advanced photo editing features (among other things) that these people don't need. It's a huge misrepresentation to market it as a beginner tool because it's not. When you look at the webiste and the program itself it's quite obvious that it's not trying to compete with Photoshop proper - more like with Photoshop Elements.

roo wrote:
Oh....and another low cost option is Ulead's PhotoImpact. I haven't used this since version 5, and Adobe's Elements wasn't out at that time, but if I had to recommend to people I'd do it this way:

Photoshop (expensive yes, but worth every penny)

Photoshop Elements

Ulead PhotoImpact

Paint Shop Pro

I've tested all of those and would recommend them quite differently! Mine would be:

Paint Shop Pro (most people don't need to pay for the little extra functionality in Photoshop; only worthh it if it you want to be a serious graphic designer)
Photoshop (again, only if you want to pay for a little bit of extra functionality that you probably don't need)
Photoshop Elements - the interface is really nice and the usability is great; not as full featured as other applications (I find it baffling that they are marketeing this as a photo editor but took out most of the selection tools!).
The Gimp - the opposite of Photoshop Elements: you need to be able to figure things out (bad usability) but there is a lot more advanced functionality. And it's free.
Ulead Photo Impact - It costs $10 more than PSP, doesn't include as many features, and the usability is IMO pretty bad.

Actually, it's not really fair to rank them because they all have very different strengths and weaknesses. It depends what you want to do. I am working on writing up an extensive comparison chart of the four low cost options.

The (IMO) most important thing that Photoshop has that I haven't found in any of the others is layer effects. Are they worth $500??? I'm not so sure... Actually, I'd recommend Photoshop v. 5.5 above PSP if you could get it. I can't remember when they introduced layer effects though...

Illustrator (ditto..the cost)
Inkscape (Free)

These are vector tools and aren't really comparable IMO. Illustrator is in a completely different league, but, again, most people don't need that level of functionality. Inkscape is a good alternative for people who just need to do a few things.

To cover all graphic design programs, Fireworks and Expression Graphic Designer should also be included. These are hybrid raster/vector programs that do both adequately but neither really well. I'd only recommend them if you wanted to pay money for a second piece of software. Fireworks is useful for some types of web graphics (but not for a lot of photo editing).

demonhale wrote: I noticed this too, but so far I think two versions of PSP are the most useful... PSP7 is fast and you can get what you need from photoshop in this version... I cant reiterate the importance of fast and lightweight footprint of PSP7... While on PSP9 although a bit heavier, the coolest thing I find in this version is the smart tool layout, and the color palette that you can mix color in just like a paint, you can make great paintings that really look like its painted by hands...

I agree about the lightweight. Most of the graphics work I do now consists of things like cropping and resizing and a few minor alterations - photoshop is way too resource intensive to bother with. I tried that colour mixer thing in PSP and although I thought it was kind of cool, I wasn't sure it would be that useful.