Alternatives to PS - what they can and can not do?

[Adamphotoman]

Be care full with infranview. If you save anything it strips all the metadata.

[sog1927]

On closer examination, Acorn appears to convert files to 8-bit, even though the documentation suggests otherwise. Am I missing something ? Why go to the trouble of making an otherwise lovely application and not provide support for decent bit depth ? I could understand if they were trying to build the application on different platforms, but OS X only should make that easier, no ?

Sorry to be a year late ;-). The Acorn documentation says that 8-bit is the default depth, but that you can change it in the Image->Image Depth menu. Did you not find this to be the case (it wouldn't be the first time that a documented feature didn't work ;-) )? Furthermore, it goes on to say:

"If you open up a 64 or 48 bit image in Acorn, Acorn will place your image into a 64 bit workflow and save the image in a 64 bit format."

[cabbiinc]

I know this is an old thread but Corel Paintshop Pro does everything the OP asks. And they've stated a number of times that they will not go down the path of rental only, but they likely will offer it as an alternative to buying the software license outright. About the only thing mentioned in this thread that it doesn't do is stitch photos. It also doesn't work with ColorPerfect, the author of which doesn't want to make it compatible to PSP and Corel doesn't want to make PSP compatible to ColorPerfect.

[Noah B]

I like using photoshop and lightroom combined. Lightroom is great for cataloging all of your files and making quick edits. There's a tab at the top that allows you to open the files as layers or single files in photoshop. Photoshop is great for compositing and focus stacking, plus a variety of other things lightroom can't do.

[Joseph O'Neil]

I know this is an old thread but Corel Paintshop Pro does everything the OP asks. And they've stated a number of times that they will not go down the path of rental only, but they likely will offer it as an alternative to buying the software license outright. About the only thing mentioned in this thread that it doesn't do is stitch photos. It also doesn't work with ColorPerfect, the author of which doesn't want to make it compatible to PSP and Corel doesn't want to make PSP compatible to ColorPerfect.

We use the new 64 bit Corel Paint Shop Pro X6. Fantastic program. I also use Lightroom. Between the two, they do everything I need, but as the old saying goes, your mileage can and will vary.

[AuditorOne]

I am using Lightroom right now but I just picked up Corel Paint Shop Photo Pro.

[Barry Kirsten]

I've been following this thread with interest because I can't afford PS at Australian prices (roughly 2x $US price) and won't get sucked into the new Adobe web rental scheme. I've been using Pixelmator for Mac for several years but its main drawback has until now been low bit depth. I was looking into Acorn which can operate at higher bit depth, then checked to see if there have been any changes in Pixelmator. I was very happy to find that version 3.1 Marble, "now supports 16-bit per channel images for the first time." See http://www.pixelmator.com/ It's not PS, but I feel Pixelmator is now a well-specified alternative.

Barry

[Sal Santamaura]

Within the last month this

http://www.serif.com/photoplus/

X8 version of PhotoPlus was introduced. It claims full 16-bit editing, curves and is very reasonably priced. Has anyone here used it yet? If so, how does it compare to CS6? Thanks in advance for your input.