newbie advice on packages

Gulp Friction · #1 01-26-2007, 01:29 AM

I have a fuji finepix E500 which is not too bad a camera for a compact ,i had Paint Shop Pro 7 and then PSP8--which i still use --i have had Photoshop elements (coverdisc) and quite liked that though there was a loss in quality if retouched too much --i have "aquired " photoshop 7 and am trying to see the advantages over my genuine Paint Shop Pro 8.
I understand that Photoshop is the industry standard but the results i get from PSP8 are exellent --is it just a name thing and the price tag that makes it so good?
Plus i was gutted when Corel bought out Jasc (a previous moody sales telephone converstion put me off them )--is it worth upgrading to whatever version is now current?--or do i pay the bucks for a validated photoshop
Please advise --thanking all of you in advance --

Rich XX

I. V. Razmanov · #2 01-26-2007, 08:19 AM

What makes Photoshop so special is not the name or price. It is the ability to work with CMYK, spot colors, and other professional print-related things. If you don't know what "spot color" is, you most likely don't need it :-)

If all you need is photos, then Paint Shop Pro is likely to be sufficient. I personally have Photoshop 7, and I'm more comfortable with it than with Paint Shop Pro, but this is the result of years spent working with Photoshop. Still, I often find myself switching to Paint Shop Pro for this or that particular task.

What as to versions of Paint Shop Pro, I like 8 and 9 (having a couple of photo related filters added). What as to Corel ones, I, like many others, am somewhat disappointed. On the other hand, they are adding 16 bits per channel support, which is good (Photoshop 7 also have some limited support for it).

Swampy · #3 01-26-2007, 08:30 AM

In this day and age.... tool of your choice and one that suits both your input and output needs.

Do you shoot in Camera Raw? Does your digital editing program support it?

Do you have need to do prepress/web design/ work? If so, the integration of the Adobe CS package has great advantages in controlling color and quality throughout the project.

As for pushing pixels around, Paint Shop Pro and Photoshop are about equal. There are a few advantages and disadvantages to both. Photoshop is probably the default editor for high end work.