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cblurton
25-Jun-2006, 22:52
Okay, my head is really beginning to hurt. Too much to learn too quickly ...

I've done the "Which camera?" thing and bought a Shen-Hao as my starter LF camera, I've found my first two lenses on eBay - a 90mm and 210mm; I'm collecting a myriad of other bits and pieces for my kit like film holders, lens wraps, cable releases, backpack, tripod, and a darkcloth; I've got a new iMac; I'm stuck with a legacy Canon scanner/printer for the moment; and I'm searching for sources of 4x5 film and developing where I live in Hong Kong. Whew!

As I'm assembling my system to handle my thus far imaginary 4x5 film to inkjet printer workflow, I am considering which software to use on my iMac to edit and print images. There was a time when there would have been no question - the best and obvious choice was Photoshop. But now - at a minimum - there is Apple's Aperture, Adobe's Photoshop or Lightroom, and Lightcraft's Lightzone to consider (not to mention Nikon's Capture and other products!)

I've looked at all of these products' Web site and read some reviews:

Aperture
http://www.apple.com/aperture
http://www.creativepro.com/story/feature/24164.html?cprose=daily

Lightroom
http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/lightroom
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/software/lightroom1.shtml

Lightzone
http://www.lightcrafts.com
http://www.macworld.com/2006/02/reviews/lightzone1

Photoshop CS2
http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop
http://www.macworld.com/2005/06/reviews/photoshopcs2/index.php

I am leaning towards Aperture ($300)* or Lightroom (beta and still free), instead of Photoshop CS2 ($650) or Lightzone ($150) for no good reason other than they are being build from the ground up for photographers and they are new. Before I make a decision, I would great appreciate hearing your views. Do you have a favorite, a different recommendation or a cautionary tale?

Best wishes,

Craig

*Prices are approximate and in US dollars.

Giacomo GIRINO
26-Jun-2006, 02:35
"they are being build from the ground up for photographers"

you may want to add Picture Window Pro to the list: www.dl-c.com

Lino

Walter Calahan
26-Jun-2006, 04:04
Don't forget Photo Mechanic

http://www.camerabits.com/

Very popular with photo-journalist because of its speed. The team that writes the program is very dedicated to constant upgrades to add features requested by working photographers.

Try it. I use it all the time.

Joe Lipka
26-Jun-2006, 05:00
Oh, let's just make it a bit more interesting. There is software known as GIMP. It's open source software for picture editing. Don't know if it runs on MAC.

Ted Harris
26-Jun-2006, 06:00
I dodn't know why you lumped LightZone in with Photoshop. LightZone has not only been designed from the ground up forphotographers it has been designed to use Zone System concepts and it is designed by a large format photographer, a member of this Forum, Lars Vinberg. I findit both quick and intuitive for most of the basic image manipulation steps.

GIMP is vry full featured but has most of the drawbacks of Photoshop. I was excited about Aperture when Apple first anounced but that excitement quickly disappated it seems to be nice software but squarely aimed at digital capture as the starting point of the image and I am not about to makethe investment to find out more.

Ted Harris
26-Jun-2006, 06:00
I dodn't know why you lumped LightZone in with Photoshop. LightZone has not only been designed from the ground up forphotographers it has been designed to use Zone System concepts and it is designed by a large format photographer, a member of this Forum, Lars Vinberg. I findit both quick and intuitive for most of the basic image manipulation steps.

GIMP is vry full featured but has most of the drawbacks of Photoshop. I was excited about Aperture when Apple first anounced but that excitement quickly disappated it seems to be nice software but squarely aimed at digital capture as the starting point of the image and I am not about to makethe investment to find out more.

Brian Ellis
26-Jun-2006, 09:05
The reviews I've read of Aperture haven't been overly enthusiastic and I think I read somewhere that Apple claims it's intended as a supplement to, not a substitute for, Photoshop. I'd probably suck it up and buy Photoshop CS2 (or a light version, I don't see Photoshop Elements on your list, has it disappeared?), if for no other reason than the fact that almost every instruction manual, magazine article, internet information, workshop, etc. dealing with digital editing of photographs seems to be based on Photoshop. It's what most people seem to use, it's the language most people seem to speak. I don't think you're likely to use many, perhaps most, of its features - I doubt that I use it for more than maybe 10% of what it's capable of doing - but it seems to have become the standard in the industry and I would think someone not familiar with it would be at something of a disadvantage when it comes to learning and communicating with others (though people who use other things might correct me on this).

Ted Chambers
26-Jun-2006, 09:29
I'd also add to the suggestion to look at Picture Window Pro. It was designed as a photo editing program and is much more intuitive than Photoshop.

Bob McCarthy
26-Jun-2006, 09:53
I might suggest waiting (before committing) for NIK's new product sold under the Nikon Banner. Certainly not for 35mm only.

http://www.outbackphoto.com/artofraw/raw_29/essay.html

Looks very interesting. NIK is a very capable company.

Bob

Marko
26-Jun-2006, 10:43
No intention to denigrate any package mentioned here, they're all fine programs, but Photoshop has two huge advantages, IMO:

1. It is now on it's 9th version with the 10th to be released within a year, probably less. That's an awful lot of development and refinement invested in it. Chances are that it will be more sophisticated and more stable than any package in its first or second generation.

2. It is also a virtual standard in any graphics-related industry. That means lots of support, third party plugins, books, tutorials, workshops, etc.

Yes, it is expensive and it has a steep learning curve. But there is a reason for both. You get what you pay for. And you can always start learning with Elements like Brian suggested and then move up when you're ready.

Bruce Watson
26-Jun-2006, 11:10
I dodn't know why you lumped LightZone in with Photoshop. LightZone has not only been designed from the ground up forphotographers it has been designed to use Zone System concepts and it is designed by a large format photographer, a member of this Forum, Lars Vinberg. I findit both quick and intuitive for most of the basic image manipulation steps.
How does LightZone handle really large files - like you get with you scan 5x4 and 10x8 film? Photoshop doesn't like large file sizes in my experience (it takes several minutes to save a 1.1GB Tiff file, for instance). What does LightZone do better than Photoshop? What does Photoshop do better than LightZone?

Greg Miller
26-Jun-2006, 11:36
I think Aperture could be considered an alternative to the Adobe Bridge but not a replacement for Photoshop CS2.

Bob McCarthy
26-Jun-2006, 13:16
No intention to denigrate any package mentioned here, they're all fine programs, but Photoshop has two huge advantages, IMO:

1. It is now on it's 9th version with the 10th to be released within a year, probably less. That's an awful lot of development and refinement invested in it. Chances are that it will be more sophisticated and more stable than any package in its first or second generation.

2. It is also a virtual standard in any graphics-related industry. That means lots of support, third party plugins, books, tutorials, workshops, etc.

Yes, it is expensive and it has a steep learning curve. But there is a reason for both. You get what you pay for. And you can always start learning with Elements like Brian suggested and then move up when you're ready.

PS is a classic "jumbo" software with far more features than one can ever concieve of using, not mentioning the years of work required to understand its intracacies. It is not designed for the photographer, but for the graphic artist. Don't get me wrong. I am very well versed in PS (I own a software dev company that uses, PS, 3Dmax, etc extensively) and have great respect for what Adobe has created.

There are other companies capable of creating first class software. Looks like Adobe is attempting to buy them and keep the market to themselves. Pixmantic is todays example. Being sole sourced on Adobe is almost as bad as being sole sourced with Microsoft. We all love the Knolls, but its the suits that set the pricing, release features, etc.

Its a remarkable program that has massively bulked up. Aperature shot across the bow of Photoshop, and Adobe is responding with Lightroom which uses the core logic without the flab. Better for almost all end users.

Sorry, (getting off my soapbox)

Bob

robc
26-Jun-2006, 14:30
Microsoft has recently acquired some software which its calling "expression". You can get it free from their web site. It has some good features and is worth looking at.
It's not commercially available yet and you need XP to run it but since its free for now take a look at the graphic designer package. Photomontage looks good.

http://www.microsoft.com/products/expression/en/graphic_designer/default.mspx

Michael Heald
27-Jun-2006, 06:26
Hello! After reading these Posts, I've looked over LightZone.

I'm curious - does LightZone perform its editing functions in 16 bit or 8 bit depth? Best regards.

Mike

Giacomo GIRINO
27-Jun-2006, 07:12
Although "LightZone always works in a 16-bit linear color space..." what I find could be a limit is fixing the number of zones at 8 (or 16 half-zones); perhaps having a variable, user definable, number of zones would be more flexible.

Lino

Dominique Labrosse
27-Jun-2006, 07:56
I don't think Lightroom or Aperature will hold much value for you. These are applications designed for editing and adjusting large numbers of RAW images non-destructively. I can't see much value in using Lighroom with film based 4x5 workflow as the develop and contact/print functions happen outside of the digital world. These applications may have some value if you wish to build a web gallery of keeper scans. Aperature has been designed for a pretty high-spec machine/video card combo and unless you have the latest Intel iMac with 256 VRAM I would recommend against buying it. Lightroom is free until at least January '07 and even works on my old 15" G4 700 iMac... albeit quite slowly.

Judging from your post above it sounds like what you need is a program to adjust your images and serve them up to your printer... hopefully in a colour managed workflow. I would recommend you bite the bullet and buy Photoshop. Lightzone looks promising too but I don't know enough about it to recommend it.

Bruce Watson
27-Jun-2006, 07:57
Hello! After reading these Posts, I've looked over LightZone.

I'm curious - does LightZone perform its editing functions in 16 bit or 8 bit depth? Best regards.

Mike
I'd like to know too. I asked here and I also asked their technical support. No responses.

Kirk Gittings
27-Jun-2006, 08:11
From their website:

"LightZone always works in a 16-bit linear color space."

cblurton
27-Jun-2006, 08:18
So now I have more, not less, stuff to think about. You have mentioned the following candidates to consider:

Photoshop CS2 (The gorilla or "gold standard" of image manipulation software)
http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop

Photoshop Elements (The poor person's Photoshop)
http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshopelmac/index.html

Aperture (Apple's new entry specifically for [digital?] photographers)
http://www.apple.com/aperture

Lightroom (Adobe's new entry specifically for photographers)
http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/lightroom

Lightzone (Created for photographers by a LFP who frequents these forums)
http://www.lightcrafts.com

Picture Window Pro (built for photographers)
http://www.dl-c.com

Photo Mechanic (Not to be forgotten)
http://www.camerabits.com

NIK's new product (Wait for it?)
http://www.outbackphoto.com/artofraw/raw_29/essay.html

GIMP (Open source for picture editing)
http://www.gimp.org

Expression (Microsoft's entry)
http://www.microsoft.com/products/expression/en/graphic_designer/default.mspx

I hear those of you who are advocating Photoshop CS2 as the industry standard and understand the point, but I am still wondering if there are other candidates not yet mentioned or if anyone cares to make a case for why I should buy something other than PS. I guess I really want to be convinced there is a great alternative.

Best wishes,

Craig

cblurton
27-Jun-2006, 08:35
Just got off the phone with a friend who mentioned that the list didn't include Paintshop Pro X.

http://www.corel.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=Corel3/Products/Display&pid=1047025487586

Greg Miller
27-Jun-2006, 09:37
Aperture & Lightroom should not be part of your list. They are primarily pre-editing applications (for sorting, selecting, ...) that would fit into the workflow prior to the main image editing software (i.e. Photoshop).

Ted Chambers
27-Jun-2006, 11:52
Aperture & Lightroom should not be part of your list.

Probably true for now. But the code base for PS has to be getting awfully long in the tooth after so many years. I wouldn't be surprised to see Adobe try to migrate a lot of PS photo-related functionality into Lightroom over time. Just a guess.

Michael Heald
27-Jun-2006, 13:35
Hello! I received an E-Mail from the Folks at Light Zone. He confirmed that all processing is 16 bit. I was afraid that the 16 bit processing statement on their web site might have been like claims for previous versions for PS or Elements (if I remember correctly) that stated they had 16 bit processing, but on closer examination, some actions were still performed in 8 bit, but not obviously described as such so that a newbie like me could understand. Best regards.

Mike

cblurton
27-Jun-2006, 18:15
Aperture has some image editing capabilities (see below).

Aperture Web site http://www.apple.com/aperture/process/

All the tools you need

When it comes to image editing, Aperture provides a powerful suite of non-destructive adjustment tools. Using them, you can easily:

* Tweak RAW Decode settings using RAW Fine Tuning controls to adjust: contrast, sharpening, chroma blur, and noise reduction
* Use Color Meter to sample pixel values in RGB, CMYK or LAB anywhere in an image
* Fine-tune exposure
* Adjust levels (using a histogram with midtone and quadtone controls; includes Auto levels and Auto contrast settings)
* Set White Balance (includes an eyedropper for easy white point setting)
* Crop
* Modify highlights and shadow
* Mix RGB channels for perfect black-and-white conversions
* Reduce noise
* Correct red-eye
* Sharpen images (using Unsharp Mask or Sharpen Luminance tools)
* Straighten images and horizons
* Desaturate color levels
* Change a color image to Sepia (with controls to set the degree of Sepia coloration)

Aperture also includes tools for addressing one of the most common annoyances of digital photography. Dust. With its Spot tool, Aperture provides one-click, nondestructive removal of spots, dust, and blemishes. For more serious anomalies, Aperture packs a Patch tool. It can easily clone pixels from one area to another, and it offers precise controls (for softness, radius, opacity, and angle), letting you create perfect, seamless blends.

cblurton
27-Jun-2006, 18:32
Probably true for now. But the code base for PS has to be getting awfully long in the tooth after so many years. I wouldn't be surprised to see Adobe try to migrate a lot of PS photo-related functionality into Lightroom over time. Just a guess.

Lightroom has some photo editing features:

http://photoshopnews.com/2006/01/09/announcing-adobe-lightroom

The next module is Develop (shown with the left panel of small preview and Presets Browser hidden). The Develop module allows for a wide array of image controls over tone and color as well as additional controls (ala Camera Raw) for sharpening, noise and lens corrections. All edits are “metadata edits” meaning the original files are preserved and only previewed with the adjustments made. Adjustments are not actually applied until images are rendered upon Export. The controls are a superset of Camera Raw controls with very interesting additional controls added.

http://www.macworld.com/news/2006/01/08/lightroomfirstlook/index.php

Adobe promotes Lightroom as “the efficient new way for professional photographers to import, select, develop, and showcase large volumes of digital images.” Unlike Photoshop—Adobe’s image-editing application that must serve many masters, including graphic artists and Web designs—Lightroom is aimed squarely at photographers. That said, Photoshop complements Lightroom when there’s a heavy image-editing task to handle. And Lightroom makes it easy to open a picture in Photoshop. Generally speaking, though, the tools in Photoshop that photographers need most of the time exist right within Lightroom.

Ted Harris
27-Jun-2006, 19:35
Craig, you have probably spent enough tme reading. You can download fully functioning free trials of some of thr programs (e.g. LightZone) and buy older versions of others for verey small dollars on eBay. Get a few and start working .... this is the only way you will be able to make a decision. A version of Photoshop prior to CS should be very cheap and it will ahve most of the functions.

Greg Miller
28-Jun-2006, 04:24
Craig,

Your opening post said your building for "4x5 film to inkjet printer workflow".

The Lightroom features you list are for RAW images. From your link: "a robust front-end and back-end for Camera Raw".

Same goes for Aperture.

You will not be capturing RAW if shooting 4x5 film.

cblurton
28-Jun-2006, 19:57
Craig,

Your opening post said your building for "4x5 film to inkjet printer workflow".

The Lightroom features you list are for RAW images. From your link: "a robust front-end and back-end for Camera Raw".

Same goes for Aperture.

You will not be capturing RAW if shooting 4x5 film.

Hi Greg:

I left a few steps out of that description. What I am trying to create is a situation in which I shoot 4x5 film, which is then developed and scanned by a local custom lab, after which I import the scan into an image processing package on my Mac, do the necessary work, then print the end product.

I wouldn't mind doing my own BW developing but I live in a very small, one room serviced apartment in the Central District of Hong Kong with my wife so a darkroom isn't possible. No room when in use and no storage when not in use.

Best wishes,

Craig

cblurton
28-Jun-2006, 20:07
Craig, you have probably spent enough time reading.

Hi Ted:

You have no idea! I've spent more hours than I can tally reading through posts in this forum.

As I said in a post elsewhere, I am returning to photography after a 30 year absence and am just getting started with LF. All of this is because of a potential book deal which is on hold at the moment. The short version of the reason it is on hold is that there is another book due out in a couple of months on the same topic, but from a different viewpoint. Publisher wants to wait until that book is launched before starting another. This delay is a good thing since I have so much to learn and so little gray matter to learn it with.

I agree I should just pick one software package and get started. But since these packages all have a learning curve, I wanted to make sure I was being wise in my choice before I made the investment. Hearing from the people in this forum, in my view, is the best possible source of excellent advice available anywhere in any medium.

Having listened carefully, and given my budget, I've decided to start with PS Elements and Adobe Lightroom.

Best wishes,

Craig

robc
29-Jun-2006, 03:59
whilst PS is maybe not be the most intuitive tool on the market and has a steep learning curve, that can all be be overcome because there are a huge amount of online tutorials on the web which can greatly cut down learning time. A lot of the lesser packages don't have that benefit or at least not to such an extent.

One tip is that PS has available hundreds of "Plugins", most of those plugins don't give you anything which can't be achieved by using the tools already available in PS. So don't rush out buying additional plugins. There are often free versions available or a tutorial on how to do the same thing without a plugin. And don't confuse plugins with actions. Infact an action is probably what you would use instead of a plugin.

Also plugins often don't allow you to step backwards through the steps in the plugin which makes tweaking what you have done more difficult. An action allows you to step backwards through every step.

Henry Ambrose
29-Jun-2006, 04:21
Remember that you can buy (legally) older versions of Photoshop for much less than the full price latest version. In the last several releases there haven't been any changes that are earth shattering. (some will differ with this statement but for practical use I assure you most any version released in the last several years will do the job). You'll get a chance to know Photoshop for not much money. When you get real familiar or buy a newer more powerful machine you can upgrade if you think you need it.

Greg Miller
29-Jun-2006, 10:38
Hi Greg:

I left a few steps out of that description. What I am trying to create is a situation in which I shoot 4x5 film, which is then developed and scanned by a local custom lab, after which I import the scan into an image processing package on my Mac, do the necessary work, then print the end product.

I wouldn't mind doing my own BW developing but I live in a very small, one room serviced apartment in the Central District of Hong Kong with my wife so a darkroom isn't possible. No room when in use and no storage when not in use.

Best wishes,

Craig


Craig,

To me, Aperture's strengths are pre-viewing many (dozens or hundreds) images, stacking similar images and comparing images within stacks. Yes, Aperture has some caablilites to edit images, primarily intended for RAW files, but I do not see that as its strength. I just returned from Alaska and have hundreds of images captured with a DSLR. I used Adobe Bridge to rank the images and select the keepers (Aperture probably would have been a better tool if I owned it). I think Aperture and Lightroom both are at their best dealing wioth RAW images, not scanned images.

I am assuming that you are not working with dozens or hundreds of images since you are shooting 4x5. My situation with 4x5 is similar to yours except that I view my tranparencies on a light table to select the keepers, and then scan the keepers. But if I were in your shoes, I would just open the scanned images in my image editor (in my case Photoshop CS2) to evaluate each image. I would choose the best software intended for editing images for now - you'll have your hands full with that function. After you comfortable with that then you can look to add other tools to your repertoire. My vote goes for Photoshop because that's the clear standard in the world. It does everything you will need and there's a huge population out there that can hlp you if you need it. Other new tools are hitting the market (like Aperture) that serve a slightly different niche (volume digital shooters) but I personally don't see them fitting your needs.

Good luck with your choice.

cblurton
30-Jun-2006, 06:30
Okay, I just have to say it, DAMN there are some smart, experienced, knowledgeable, and helpful people here in the Large Format Photography Forum!

Craig

plugsnpixels
15-Jul-2006, 17:12
Speaking of plug-ins, actions and image editing apps, I've put together a one-stop directory where you can get info about the apps already discussed in this thread and others as well (site access is free; no registration is required).

See URL in my sig.

Paul Coppin
10-Aug-2006, 17:48
Just to confuse things, I'm a huge fan of Paint Shop Pro 7 for a lot of the basics and tweek for printing in PS7. Know that all of the adobe products are HUGE memory hogs. If you work with big files in Adobe, you WILL lock up windows machines regularly, unless you've invested in hi-powered windows boxes.

DrPablo
10-Aug-2006, 21:22
For those of you with an educational affiliation (teacher / student / trainee / professor / administrator, etc) at almost any educational institution from elementary school up through medical schools, you can get HUGE discounts on certain software packages. I got a new, full copy of CS2 from academicsuperstore.com for about $270 because of my academic affiliation. I don't know about lightroom or aperture (haven't looked), but they do have a very inexpensive (under $100) price for PS Elements 4.0. I used Elements versions 2 and 3 before getting CS2, and I thought version 3 was outstanding -- I'm sure version 4 is better.

Marko
10-Aug-2006, 23:17
Just to confuse things, I'm a huge fan of Paint Shop Pro 7 for a lot of the basics and tweek for printing in PS7. Know that all of the adobe products are HUGE memory hogs. If you work with big files in Adobe, you WILL lock up windows machines regularly, unless you've invested in hi-powered windows boxes.

PSP is a fairly decent package, especially for the price. But it's Windows-only and the original poster is on a Mac.

On the other hand, memory is really cheap these days, and so is disk space. Especially if you can afford CS2... Maxing out on both can do wonders for otherwise unremarkable computer, be it a PC or a Mac. It provides much more bang-for-the-buck than boosting raw cpu power.

Richard Kelham
11-Aug-2006, 02:53
Forget PSP and Picture Windows and all the other Windoze only stuff recommended by folks who didn't read your original post. You can probably also forget all the stuff like Aperture and Lightroom which are designed for use with DSLRs which narrows the field a bit.

GIMP works under X11 on Macs and is probably as fully featured as PS though no faster. Both are probably over-specified if you only want to tweak your scans for printing. LightZone sounds interesting though I've never tried it. Bear in mind you are going to be working with some quite large files, especially in 16bit...

400d
14-Aug-2006, 20:45
So no one touched Photoimpact? It's a Taiwanese software and got improved a lot during the last 6 years. I started using it since 2000. However, when time passed by and I got serious into photography, I realize that Photoshop is the industry standard, gotta learn that stuff! Plus, Photoimpact works a lil. different than PS that, when you do effects, it applies directly to the image, which in photoshop you can always do layers for effect and it's a very valuable tool. So about 3 years ago I moved to PS.
There are CorelDraw and PSP, haven't really touched CorelDraw, but I tried to get started with PSP, it doesn't work for me for some reason. And Gimp! is a totally different ball game, since it's free :)

Don Wallace
15-Aug-2006, 08:29
My needs are quite simple but I always have trouble. All I want to do is scan colour neg and pos, with very minimal manipulation, and print. The problem is always getting the print to match the screen. I have varying degrees of success.

With PS, you definitely get what you pay for, but it is made for graphic designers, definitely not photographers. For me, it would be like buying a moving van to go pick up some milk at the corner store. I have Elements and even that requires far too much time reading and buggering around with the computer. I need to know way more than should be necessary to get a decent colour print, and I would like to get something a lot more streamlined for my workflow (scan, print - pretty basic). Software designers seem to think that the more options any tool has, the happier everyone will be. If your stove came with that much over-information, we would all starve to death.

Any suggestions?

paulr
15-Aug-2006, 09:27
My needs are quite simple but I always have trouble. All I want to do is scan colour neg and pos, with very minimal manipulation, and print. The problem is always getting the print to match the screen. I have varying degrees of success.

those are simple needs, but sadly there's no simple solution. getting the print to match what you see on the screen is a whole avocation! and it's not possible to do perfectly; the goal is to get close enough that you only go through a few sheets of paper rather than a few dozen. It comes down to color management, and I'm afraid there are no quick solutions to that. you're going to have to do a bit of homework.


With PS, you definitely get what you pay for, but it is made for graphic designers, definitely not photographers. For me, it would be like buying a moving van to go pick up some milk at the corner store.

well, it is made for photographers. for graphic designers too ... and for web production people, and digital media artists, and scientists ...

think of it as a big shop full of tools. you're under no obligation to learn how to use all of them. it just takes a bit of guidance to figure out which ones you want to master. it's not like buying a moving van to pick up milk. it's more like having a fleet of vehicles, and you get to pick whichever one's best for the trip to the store. This may seem like overkill, but the truth is that none of the simpler alternatives has the basic power you need to make photographs look their best. people who say that a photographer doesn't need layers and channels have not learned the techniques that employ those features. ones you learn the techniques, there's no going back to a lower end program. you'll only get frustrated.

Bob McCarthy
15-Aug-2006, 12:01
I've been experimenting with the new Nikon editing software called Capture NX by NIK Multimedia. In a word amazing. It has the most powerful masking technology that alone makes it worth the price of admission. Printing facility, including soft proofing, is very capable.

It's not a raw converter, and handles tiffs and JPEGs quite well.

It's free for 30 days, and I'd suggest a photoshop class machine as well.

Bob