Editing your Photos

[cjstarr]

What program do you use to photoshop your pictures?
Do you use Adobe, Ulead, or another program to touch up the photos that you take?
On a scale of 1 to 3 is the program difficult to use, (with 1 being the most difficult).
Does one program give you more control over the process but is harder to use or understand.
Which program do you use and why?

 

[Master Mason]

For processing my RAW's I use lightroom. I can do any basic color corrections and cropping with that, which is about 99% of the PP I do.

If I need something else, then I go to Photoshop CS2. It's what I bought and have, but from what I know now, I most likely could have done everything I actually do in Elements.

 

[emmabelle]

I'm a newbie to photo editing and I just bought Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo x2. It's easy for a beginner like me and it does everything that I would need it to do, being a hack photographer.

 

[YEKCIM]

Charles,

I used Picasa at first, then Paint Shop Pro and finally bit the bullet and bought an OEM copy of PS Elements 5. I don't like editing and am not much good at it, but have found that PSE5 is easier (for me) to learn and use than PSP and does some things that I need to do that Picasa does not have. I probably use 10% of Elements' potential, but it has been a good "fit" for me, personally.

~Ed

 

[MICKEY88]

I use corel paint shop pro photo X2, from all the reviews I've read it will basically do everything that photoshop will do at a fraction of the cost, and has a mush easier learning curve,,

a lot of actions are built in one click deals.. there is a tooth whitener brush a suntan brush a blemish remover.. all really simple things...

 

[emmabelle]

I use corel paint shop pro photo X2, from all the reviews I've read it will basically do everything that photoshop will do at a fraction of the cost, and has a mush easier learning curve,,

a lot of actions are built in one click deals.. there is a tooth whitener brush a suntan brush a blemish remover.. all really simple things...

I love the toothbrush whitener, my daughter's teeth have never looked better. Oops, don't tell her I said that.

 

[MICKEY88]

I love the toothbrush whitener, my daughter's teeth have never looked better. Oops, don't tell her I said that.

I just did a senior pic shoot last saturday, the boy didn't want to smile, I got a few pics with teeth showing, then found out a few days later that he didn't want to smile because he didn't think his teeth were white enough, I whitened them on one pic and emailed it to his mother , she said he was smiling big time after seeing the pic, and wanted me to do it to all of them..

I can also whiten them with Portrait Professional , but I do most of my editing with PSP X2, unless I need to do serious facial touch up work..

 

[emmabelle]

I just bought the program yesterday and here's a photo my son took in Europe last week.

Before

After

I straightened it and got rid of the extra stuff that was distracting. I've never used a photo editor before and I found it pretty easy to do this. It's not perfect, but I'm sure I'll get better at it.

 

[jann1033]

i'm using lightroom for 90+%, alienskin for some b/w coversions and weirdo processing and photoshop elements 5 for painting stuff mostly, xero,vitual photographer for what is left. i like some of their presets for vignetting etc, if i could figure out how to use the lr clone tool to get rid of my 2 sensor glop spots i would probably open pse5 once every couple days or less just to use the paint stuff.
i'd rate as,vp,xero as 3-2.5 (,vp the easiest) the other 2 at 1-2.5 to really be proficient at using all they have to offer, but easy for basics.
vp & xero are free but don't do basics like cropping,more for things like softening, effects

 

[TheGoofster]

I use a program called photo Explosion 4. I really like it, but it's not the easiest program to use. I would probably give it a 1.5 to 2 on the difficulty scale. You can actually do quite a lot with it, but unlike many programs you have to work at it a bit sometimes.
I use it because I found it at a Yard Sale for 1.00. Someday I'll probably get something else, but for right now it meets most of my editing needs. If you ever do run across it at a good price I would recommend giving it a try.

 

[elizke]

Paintshop Pro here too. It can go from simple to powerful, depending on what you want to do. It's easy to use and all I'll ever need.

In the newest version, I love to on occasion sneak a little "thinnify" effect in. People always love my pictures of them! I don't consider it cheating either. Sometimes cameras catch some really bad angles that are NOT how one really looks.

 

[AlienBrain]

It depends on what you want to do. Are you editing RAW files? If so, you should be using Adobe LightRoom/Photoshop in tandem OR Apple's Aperture (if you have a Mac).

If you are editing jpeg's, use Adobe Photoshop.

 

[MICKEY88]

It depends on what you want to do. Are you editing RAW files? If so, you should be using Adobe LightRoom/Photoshop in tandem OR Apple's Aperture (if you have a Mac).

If you are editing jpeg's, use Adobe Photoshop.

hmm why SHOULD one use those programs, that seems much stronger than
simply explaining what you use and why you like it..

 

[AlienBrain]

hmm why SHOULD one use those programs, that seems much stronger than
simply explaining what you use and why you like it..

Obviously it is just my opinion . But seriously, each professional photographer I have ever conversed with uses strictly Photoshop CS2 or CS3. All they use at Art Institute of Atlanta in photography is PhotoShop because it is the industry standard. It has tons of support on the web (tutorials, etc.) therefore it is easy enough for a beginner to use and advanced enough for professional photographers to utilize.

If you want to start of small and move on to serious editing, photoshop is the way to go. Trust me, no professionals will argue with that.

If you want to do very basic editing (red eye reduction, straightening photos, using a harsh brush to whiten things, etc.), then don't get photoshop or lightroom. Actually, you don't even have to pay for that type of software, you can probably find freeware that does that type of stuff.

 

[Master Mason]

Obviously it is just my opinion . But seriously, each professional photographer I have ever conversed with uses strictly Photoshop CS2 or CS3. All they use at Art Institute of Atlanta in photography is PhotoShop because it is the industry standard. It has tons of support on the web (tutorials, etc.) therefore it is easy enough for a beginner to use and advanced enough for professional photographers to utilize.

If you want to start of small and move on to serious editing, photoshop is the way to go. Trust me, no professionals will argue with that.

If you want to do very basic editing (red eye reduction, straightening photos, using a harsh brush to whiten things, etc.), then don't get photoshop or lightroom. Actually, you don't even have to pay for that type of software, you can probably find freeware that does that type of stuff.

Ummmm.... the professional that asked you the question might argue with you a bit, just saying...

 

[MICKEY88]

Obviously it is just my opinion . But seriously, each professional photographer I have ever conversed with uses strictly Photoshop CS2 or CS3. All they use at Art Institute of Atlanta in photography is PhotoShop because it is the industry standard. It has tons of support on the web (tutorials, etc.) therefore it is easy enough for a beginner to use and advanced enough for professional photographers to utilize.

If you want to start of small and move on to serious editing, photoshop is the way to go. Trust me, no professionals will argue with that.

If you want to do very basic editing (red eye reduction, straightening photos, using a harsh brush to whiten things, etc.), then don't get photoshop or lightroom. Actually, you don't even have to pay for that type of software, you can probably find freeware that does that type of stuff.

photo shop is the industry standard, because of the printing/publishing industry, paint shop pro will do everything photo shop will do as far as photo editing, and it's only $80

google paint shop pro photo X2, you will find a lot of reviews all pretty much backing what I've said, and quite a few by pros..,

paint shop pro has a much easier learning curve, after showing several friends how quickly I could edit photos, they quit using photo shop and bought PSP
I'm sure a lot of schools use photoshop, adobe gives it away to them so students later buy what they have learned to use..

I don't buy into advertising I tested both products before buying either one...

PSP is much more than a basic editing program..


oh and as far as a harsh brush for whitening things, that tells me you've never seen PSP in action, actually the tooth whitener tool is just a one click tool and it whitens teeth to the degree that you want, and it's very natural looking...


for portrait work..
Portrait Professional will touch up a portrait, in a fraction of the time you could do it with photo shop, so photo shop is not the only way to go

 

[jann1033]

Ummmm.... the professional that asked you the question might argue with you a bit, just saying...

hehe i was thinking the exact same thing
...and while I don't have the full version photoshop i don't think it has nearly the features as corel painter x ( for that particular type of photo processing) so to me it is kind of shortsited to downplay any product that would do what you want/need to do, no matter who makes it or how little it costs...
imo in a lot of cases the quality of the product has nothing to do with the amount of people who use it, at least not as much as heavy marketing does. at first i was sorry i got elements, thinking i should have gotten the full photoshop version but really i use alien skin and other non adobe programs more for the type of processing i want to do( after raw conversion)...and i still haven't spent as much as i would have for full version photoshop and can do what i want to do( well once i get painter x i will be able to at least), even though really my favorite things to do with photos is more "artsy fartsy " stuff that some hobbiest might not want to do.

i wonder what the real statistics are for photoshop and pro photographers usage vs all the other pro software out there most non pro consumers haven't ever even heard of..and how many have bought photoshop and can use only the crop tool( ie the "it costs a lot so i must need it" syndrome)

hey mark add "photoshop vs all the other guys" in your holy war thread

 

[MarkBarbieri]

hey mark add "photoshop vs all the other guys" in your holy war thread

I'm going to refuse just to see if I can start an "is that really a holy war or not" holy war.

As for the PS or not debate, I'm kind of in the middle on this. AlienBrain makes some good points about there being a huge universe of information on how to do things using Photoshop. It is the industry standard and just about everyone writes their education materials based on it. It is also the industry standard for graphic arts shops, so if you do a lot of corporate work, it's a necessity.

For an individual photographer, it's not so clear. First, it's user interface is a nightmare for new users. It's poweful once you've gone through the pain of learning it. It can do many things that others can't or can't readily do, but those tend to be pretty esoteric for the typical shooter.

I usually council casual shooters to stay the heck away from it as it will just frustrate them and generate support calls for me. For serious shooters, I recommend that the consider Elements. It gets your feet wet with Adobe's tools without the steep price and learning curve of photoshop. I also try to steer hobbyist shooters to Lightroom over a pixel editor because it does much more of what they want in a way that is much more efficient. I'm a big Lightroom fan.

If you are editing jpeg's, use Adobe Photoshop.

This is the one statement that I emphatically disagree with. First, I usually always recommend against editing JPEGs because every time you open one, change it, and save it, you lose a little more quality to compression. Second, because Lightroom handles JPEGs very well now. Even better, Lightroom doesn't edit the pixels in the file. It just stores the metadata describing the adjustments, so you don't have the quality loss in the JPEG for multiple edits.

 

[MICKEY88]

This is the one statement that I emphatically disagree with. First, I usually always recommend against editing JPEGs because every time you open one, change it, and save it, you lose a little more quality to compression. Second, because Lightroom handles JPEGs very well now. Even better, Lightroom doesn't edit the pixels in the file. It just stores the metadata describing the adjustments, so you don't have the quality loss in the JPEG for multiple edits.

paint shop pro has a setting that autosaves the original, so you never change it, you work on a copy and save the copy..

 

[oogieboogieman]

Okay, it is a Holywar! I thought it would turn into one. I've been wanting to get some kind of photo editing software for a long, long time. DW controls all monies, been planning our 2 week stay in August since December. So how much does a good program cost? I have one that came with my Olympus camera but I believe its only a trial. Please someone point me in the right direction. DW thinks we are talking several hundred dollars- I really hope not. Thanks