Photoshop vs. Paintshop Pro

[dvcfamily41801]

Which would be better for a total non computer person trying to remove redeye, crop and zoom our WDW pictures? A friend uses Photoshop and my FIL suggested the Paintshop. I need VERY easy to use.

Thanks!

 

[Sonno]

Well... if you are SURE you want "very easy to use", and are ok with using a much inferior product; than I guess I'd say go with Paint Shop Pro. However, if you want to own the absolute BEST graphic arts program on the market today, and don't mind doing a little reading and learning, get Photoshop. There's really no comparison.

 

[boBQuincy]

You would probably be happy with Photoshop Elements (4). Some of the power of Phtotoshop, very little of the learning curve of Photoshop.

 

[spoon2003]

If you want something easy, try Picasa2. It's a free tool from Google and does all the basic fixes and very easy. Try it out and if you feel you need something more, then move onto photoshop or Paintshop pro.

Sue from Boston

 

[ndelaware]

I have to add that my wife will actually use Microsofts Digital Image 2006 and that is saying alot for it's ease of use.

She opened Photoshop Elelments once and clicked the X in less than a minute.

 

[The_Horned_King]

Well... if you are SURE you want "very easy to use", and are ok with using a much inferior product; than I guess I'd say go with Paint Shop Pro. However, if you want to own the absolute BEST graphic arts program on the market today, and don't mind doing a little reading and learning, get Photoshop. There's really no comparison.

Sonno is right on the ball!

 

[alan]

Here are the options I know of:

• Photoshop - very expensive, very powerful
• Photoshop Elements - a "cut-down" version of Photoshop.
• Paint Shop Pro - slightly more expensive than Elements, considerably more powerful. Not as powerful as Paint Shop Pro
• Picasa2 - not as powerful as anything above, but still gives many of the most important basic edit technologies. Free

Of the ones that I have used, I much prefer Paint Sho Pro. It was written for a PC, and it "feels" like a PC application. Photoshop/Elements feel like what they are - applications written for another computer and ported to the PC. Which means that if you can use them on a Mac you can use them on a PC, but they still just don't feel "right" if you're a dyed-in-the-wool PC user.

I started on Paint Shop Pro, but since almost every useful magazine example of how to make improvements to photographs was based around Photoshop or Elements, I have reluctantly moved over to it. I now use Paint Shop Pro only for cropping images - it has a very useful display of the x/y ratio of the selection area when you're cropping; I can't find a way to get that in Elements.

regards,
/alan
(desperately working towards 10 postings!)

 

[alan]

I should have added...

From your description of what you want, I would look at picasa. I'm not allowed to post a link to it, but you can find it on google and choosing "tools".

regards,
/alan

 

[Sonno]

I now use Paint Shop Pro only for cropping images - it has a very useful display of the x/y ratio of the selection area when you're cropping; I can't find a way to get that in Elements.

I don't know anything about PSE, but I can tell you how you do it in PS CS2.

 

[alan]

Please do - it may work in PSE!

regards,
/alan

 

[alan]

(oops - duplicate post)

 

[Sonno]

Please do - it may work in PSE!

regards,
/alan

One min...

 

[Sonno]

If you have a box that looks like this:

Click the "Info" tab (as displayed) and then use the crop tool.
The "+" symbol on the bottom (X: Y is your cursor's position on the image grid, and next to that (W: H is the crop size info.

 

[alan]

Excellent! Thank you. It was there, hidden away under the Window menu. While it doesn't give the ratio, it does give the dimensions of the selection, and is a great step forward.

regards,
/alan

 

[Sonno]

Errr... you find the ratio somewhere else...
Hang on, lemme load this beast up again... (I have over 5,000 plugins, it takes a while to load).

 

[Sonno]

Bleh, I can't find it right now (4:00am, getting sleepy).
Best I can tell you at the moment is from the title bar select "Image > Image Size" (Alt-Ctrl-I) and see if that helps you any.

 

[alan]

You've been a great help already - thank you.

regards,
/alan

 

[MICKEY88]

contrary to some of the posts above, photoshop is not FAR superior to paint shop pro,

yes it's the industry standard, the print/graphics industry,

if you just want to edit photos paint shop pro will do everything that photoshop will do, at a fraction of the cost, and the learning curve is easier..


yes photo shop has 1000s of plugins, they will work in paint sho pro, paint shop pro has a built in learning center which is awesome...

don't just take my word for it, research paint shop pro reviews as I did, and you will find many pros, stating what I have just said.

tutorials for photo shop will also work for paint shop pro, you just have to be familiar with the tools in paint shop pro since they are sometimes named differently and function differently..


if you decide on paint shop pro I have a link to order it for only $59, but it expires soon...

 

[caniswolfie]

I do have to say that if anyone is looking into software there is a certain amount of personal preference in the user interface and work flow that needs to be taken into consideration. That is why it's best to do some comparisons, if the software has a demo available, try it. If there's a place where you can try the software, give it a shot. Even if the features are huge and does everything under the sun but the interface or the terminology drives you nuts, you aren't going to be happy with it.

This is not to say that either software is "right" or "wrong", it's just not a good fit for the person that is using the software. Personally I have used both Paint Shop Pro and Photoshop and I found Paint Shop Pro easier to use when I first started out doing things with images and Photoshop a little more supported (books, online stuff, etc.). Of course that is my experience and anyone else's may be different.

Some of it is basically deciding what you want to use it for and then try it out and see if it's a good fit for you. The big thing you probably want to find out about software is how well is it written. You want to know whether you computer will turn in a crashing fiend when it is installed or whether it has a tendancy to eat your image files or something like that. You can compare how well it handles the JPEG compression and whether is makes your picture look like it was made out of legos.

I suggest if you can try out the software, to do so since it makes a big difference on your comfort with the interface or not.