Adobe Photoshop and CS

[Cyrano]

Thanks for the link

 

[stm61]

Hope someone can answer this! Today I was looking at different photo editing programs. There were 3 on the shelf at Staples: Photshop Elements, Digital Image (or something close to that), and I'm forgetting the 3rd one. I was looking for a program that had cloning or a stamp features. The employee who helped me said the Elements won't do it, only the full version of Photoshop will, and that Elements can be almost as hard to figure out as the full version. One of the 2 other programs, think it was the Digital, said it had cloning that could be used to make posters, like taking parts of 4 smaller pics and creating a larger picture from them. The other said it had 75 stamps. What I want to do is cover over unwanted parts of a pic, like the kids are in front of the castle wall and somebody else's kid ends up in the pic. I just want to cover over the other kid, nothing really fancy, I'm only showing the pics to friends and family. Can anyone suggest a program? The employee had told me the other 2 programs wouldn't do it. When I showed him the info on the box, he said he hadn't used those programs but still didn't think they'd do what I wanted them to. I'm not familiar with any other editing programs and am basically clueless about anything other then the preset settings (auto, red-eye, etc, and not sure about some of those!) on my Kodak Easyshare Z740.

Sorry this is so long!

 

[MarkBarbieri]

Photoshop Elements doesn't have the clone feature? That surprises me. Perhaps someone with it can confirm that.

You might want to download GIMP. It's free and it's adherents swear that it is as good as Photoshop. I have to admit that I've never tried it.

 

[Gdad]

Elements 4 has a clone tool. I used it before I got CS2.

 

[jann1033]

elements 5 has a clone and stamp and is it as hard as the big photoshop?...no!
i do have a book for it...mainly because it has tons of features that might be hard to know/remember how to use( at least for me since i have no memory to speak of) but i about went nuts trying to use the trial cs2 or what ever it's called. according to the book i have( the missing manual for elements 5) with the exception of some features for raw photos, most of what the full version has is in the elements 5 but you have to know where to find it.
adobe has a free download of elements 5 on adobe .com , go try it out and see how you like it plus you'll be able to see if it does what you want

 

[fitzperry]

Your Staples clerk is mistaken. I've had PSE 3.0 and 4.0, and there most definitely is a clone tool. You were probably looking at 5.0. I've never used CS2, so I can't compare the two, but I don't think the learning curve is that steep with Elements, at least wrt basic editing.

 

[stm61]

wow! Thanks ya'll! This was Elements 5.0 and it's on sale this week. I'll go back and get it tomorrow. We live in a rural area, can't get cable or dsl, so downloading anything on dial-up is just not happening. Everything I try to download ends up with errors in it somehow. The book that goes with it is called The Missing Manual for Elements 5? I think someone on another post was talking about that, I'll have to look for that also. There might be hope for my pics after all!

Thanks again!

 

[jann1033]

wow! Thanks ya'll! This was Elements 5.0 and it's on sale this week. I'll go back and get it tomorrow. We live in a rural area, can't get cable or dsl, so downloading anything on dial-up is just not happening. Everything I try to download ends up with errors in it somehow. The book that goes with it is called The Missing Manual for Elements 5? I think someone on another post was talking about that, I'll have to look for that also. There might be hope for my pics after all!

Thanks again!

the book is not sold with it ( not sure if you understood that due to the title) but i got my copy at barnes and nobel for around $30( it's hugh....like 500 pages )

it really is amazing what it can do... this is a shot my daughter took with her 4mp easy share ...i worked and worked and tried to make it better and the first picture is the end result after trying every program that came with her camera, stuff i got with my camera, other photo programs etc...the second one with photoshop all i did was adjust the levels, remove the color cast and i think then maybe sharpen it , i should have reduced the noise also but it didn't show up that much on the 4x6 she wanted printed. the original is just a black hole behind their heads, you can't even see the musicians at all

 

[wdwmom2]

Photoshop Elements 5.0 most certainly does have the clone and stamp features. It's really not that difficult to use, although I will be purchasing the Missing Manual.

Here is a pic that I took the ducks out of the grass, and the men out of the background. They are near the fence that is by the grist mill. This was my first attempt ever at using this program and found it quite easy. I also did some cropping and color adjustments of the photo.

Before

After

 

[JonetteA]

Ok, so I LOVE this pic of you guys! I miss you both!

I miss you guys too!!

 

[JonetteA]

Hi Jonette!

Do you have any other pics with the fountain that you might be able to piece together? You'd probably need a lot of different photos...

a tip when cloning is to clone from different areas to make it look more natural...ok, that didn't make any sense, but you want everything to blend...um...let me find an example...or, can I help you with a photo?

Can you send me your email address again Cryssi?

Jonette

 

[stm61]

both those before and after pics came out great! I understood you have to get the book seperate, but thanks for making sure. I'll try barnes and Nobles or maybe Amazon if they have free shipping. Can't wait to try it, I'm definately photo-taking challeneged!

 

[Jeanne B]

I'll try barnes and Nobles or maybe Amazon if they have free shipping.

I just bought the Missing Manual from Amazon a week or so back. It's over $25 so it would qualify for free shipping.

 

[stm61]

Thanks again ya'll! I went back to Staples, got the same story from another clerk. I told him I'd spoken with people who've used Elements 5.0 and they all said the stamp and cloning features were in the program. He then actually read the box, lol, and agreed that those features probably were included. Ended up ordering both the program and the book off Amazon with free shipping because it turns out that Elements 5.0 isn't on sale this week, only the movie editing program (Premeire 3.0?) and the combo pack are.

 

[manning]

I just caused trouble in the family

My SILs Son in law deer hunts and has three heads hanging on the wall with an empty space in the center. I filled in the space...... with SIL. I thought she would enjoy it.

Using elements 3 I did a little cloning here, healing brush there and well she ended up hanging on the wall. Now there isn't an empty space. I'd post it but wife made me promise not to.

You will enjoy Elements 5.

 

[jann1033]

it may be staples is having a problem cause they basically list just the new stuff in the promo stuff..i had to call to see if a couple things were included and then they told me everything in 4 is in 5 plus some but they weren't very clear about that in the lit...have fun and post some of the stuff you do once you get it!

 

[Jeanne B]

My SILs Son in law deer hunts and has three heads hanging on the wall with an empty space in the center. I filled in the space...... with SIL. I thought she would enjoy it.

I'd post it but wife made me promise not to.

But aren't promises made to be broken?!!

 

[MarkBarbieri]

I'm curious as to why people chose CSx over Elements or vice versa. Obviously, a lot of people picked Elements because it's $100 vs $600 for CS2. I'm sure others preferred the easier to learn Elements UI. So what reasons influenced your decision?

I made my choice (Photoshop 7) eons ago, so my reasons may no longer even be valid. I picked full blow photoshop for the following reasons:

1) Actions - PS had the ability to record actions (macros) to automate a series of steps and PSE didn't. This feature alone has been worth the cost difference to me.

2) Examples - Several years ago, just about every photo processing book and website assumed that you had Photoshop and all of the examples were designed around how to do this with Photoshop. I've been noticing that many websites now offer examples for a variety of tools, but PS is still the most common.

3) Color Management - I wasn't sure how important this would be, but everyone swore it was a big deal (sort of like the DOF preview button people said I needed to have). Well, now I've had it and use it, but I'm still not sure that it would be a huge factor to me. I guess I just don't print enough. I suppose without it my prints might not match my monitor well at all and I'd be cursing the lack of sophisticated color management.

Here are a few things that didn't influence my decision but would now:
1) LAB color - I often find it much easier to make adjustments in LAB mode rather than RGB. CMYK, on the other hand, has never been of any use to me at all. I assume that's primarily for people sending things to magazines or something.

2) 16 bit support - This was very weak in PS when I first got it. So weak that I could rarely do much with a photo before having to convert it to 8 bits. Now I rarely convert to 8 bits except to save as a JPG. I've been told (but don't know for sure) that PSE still has weak 16 bit support.

3) High Dynamic Range images - I haven't played much with these, but I intend to. The problem of dealing with HDR usually hits me more when doing landscape work, and I haven't done any of that in quite a while.

4) UI - Even though the PSE user interface is much easier, I've grown accustomed to the CSx UI and would probably have trouble switching. I've been told that the CSx interface is actually more effecient once you get to know it. Not having used PSE, I couldn't confirm that. Personally, I think the CSx interface is pretty dreadful, but I've gotten used to it.

 

[jann1033]

pse 4 was the first editing program I got that didn't come free with camera or hardware.
i tried corel, photoshop ( think it was cs2) and i thought they were to hard to learn..layers drove me nuts..so i got pse 4 after a free trial and i could handle it...except layers..so i got a tutorial and book and figured layers out( well mostly).
the cost, the learning curve and the fact pse4, then 5 do what i need so far were the big factors,except still not happy with their bw conversion but i got some other stuff for that and a book on bw conversion that is helping me figure that out .
i am still learning to manipulate the tools in PS5 to get a good looking result so i wont be ready to move on till cs18 or so is available
the 16 bit conversion is also annoying me somewhat...i have just begun shooting RAW since i saw the dramatic difference but now once i do the basic conversion, any filters etc have to be done in 8 bit...i do think i might be able to do a bw conversion via desaturation but not sure i have the color channels i need to tweak it in 16 bit....but i am such a novice still . i think in order to really get the look in bw i want i will have to use a 16 bit friendly program...maybe it's just my shooting i don't know but i'm not really liking those results with ps5..with ps5 color is bw is

 

[Master Mason]

I bought the CS2, I had never worked with photo editing software, but know that PS was pretty much the market leader. There is always a learning curve with any software, I just figured I would learn the one that is the "best" right out of the schute.