Photo editing software review
Working environment
Let's start this software review with my fads, the zoom percentage display and the pixel size display.
They may not seem important for everybody, but I really think they are.
The zoom percentage display
When opening a photo with a photo editor to work on it,
the 1st thing I would like to know is if the image I am seeing on the screen is one to one or smaller than real or bigger than real.
And
how much of course.
Many photo editors show you this basic information in the title bar or in the status bar.
But by far not all do it!
Photo editing software review of programs that display the zoom percentage (or not).
The pixel size display
Similarly to the zoom percentage, when opening a photo with a photo editor to work on it,
the pixel size of an image is an important data I would like to have displayed in evidence.
Many photo editors show you this basic information in the title bar or in the status bar.
But by far not all do it!
Photo editing software review of programs that display the pixel size (or not).
Easy zoom in/out
Zooming in and out easily is a basic feature that every image or photo editor should possess.
If the authors did not realize this necessity, how user friendly will their other tools be?
When I say easy, I mean either:
left mouse button to zoom in and right mouse button to zoom out or
a + button and a - button in the tool bar
-directly accessible-
Any solution requiring to dig into the 7th cellar of the menu tree is absolutely unfriendly.
Combo boxes are rather unfriendly too.
Photo editing software review of programs that implement easy zooming in/out.
Browsing through folders with thumbnails
Browsing through folders with thumbnails is indeed a feature of photo viewers rather than photo editors,
but since many photo editors implement such a feature,
I will tell you which ones do it and if the feature is limited or convenient.
Photo editing software review of programs that implement browsing through folders with thumbnails.
Basic Image Handling
Here we will have a look into the most needed features when you optimize your photos.
JPEG compression
The best high end tool I know
-and I use it very often- to compress JPEGs is the
Advanced JPEG compressor.
It is not a photo editor, but a specialized tool.
Below we will consider the JPEG compression abilities of Photo Editors.
The only ones which give you more settings possibilities than the sole quality factor are Zoner Photo Studio and PhotoBrush.
Photo editing software review in regard of JPEG compressing abilities.
Resizing through resampling algorithms
Resizing photos should be done through resampling algorithms
For more details read our page about
resizing.
Below we will mention how many resampling algorithms are available with the different photo editors.
Photo editing software review giving the number of resampling algorithms available.
Rotating photos by a small angle
When horizon lines or buildings are slanted, a rotation by a small angle is needed.
A small angle means a few degrees, e.g. 1, 1.5, 2 etc...
Not all programs allow decimal values, but if the correction needed is very small, decimal values may be necessary.
the algorithm behind the scenes must use antialiasing, else your rotated picture will be full of ugly steps.
Unfortunately not all programs do this.
Only a few products offer a very convenient horizon correction without guesswork.
Instead of trying forth and back with different angle values,
you draw a line with your mouse over the slanted horizon line and the program calculates the needed angle itself.
Photo editing software review for the rotation by a small angle.
Keeping EXIF infos
Editing digital photos (from a digital camera) should not lose or destroy your photo's EXIF data.
Unfortunately there are many photo editors that completely lose the EXIF data,
while nearly all the others will at least smash them up partly.
So when the table below tells 'YES' it means that some EXIF data are kept while some of them may be lost or smashed up!
The way I am doing it now,
is to open any photo editor from within Exifer (auto backup of the EXIF data)
and to recover the EXIF data afterwards through Exifer's restore function.
Photo editing software review telling if EXIF data are partly kept or totally lost.
Crop to selection
Cropping an image
-cutting out the interesting part- can be convenient or awkward
The easiest is when you can draw a frame over your photo with the mouse and use a tool bar button or the return key to execute the cut.
Very important is the possibility to adjust the drawn frame after the initial draw by dragging the edges.
Very important too, is to see in the status bar the dimensions in pixels of the frame you did draw.
Photo editing software review about the crop to selection abilities.
Adding to the pixel size
What is meant here is the possibilty to add some "empty ribbon" to an image.
Let's take an example. You have an image of 400 x 300 pixels and want to paste something into it.
You may need to add a band of 100 pixels on the right side first, to make it 500 x 300 pixels.
The problem with this very easy operation is that every software call it differently.
It is often hard to guess where the function is hidden. Some call it:
Canvas and Borders (
Zoner Photo Studio)
Add a frame (
Paint Shop Pro)
Expand (
Photophilia)
Add to pixel size
Paper size
Photo editing software review of programs that let you add to the pixel size.
Color depth conversion
Sometimes you may need to change the color depth of images,
i.e. to transform a 24 bit image (16 000 000 colors) into an 8 bit image (256 colors).
Some programs may do it implicitly when saving a jpeg image as a gif image.
But the result is mostly disappointing.
Decent results are only reached by programs with an explicit conversion function that let you choose a palette and a dithering method.
Photo editing software review of programs with explicit color depth conversion.
Photo Enhancement Functions
Here we will have a look into the most needed features when you enhance your photos.
Levels adjust
Levels adjust is the key feature you need to improve bad exposures.
It may be automatic, but a manual retouch of the automaticaly determined correction should be possible.
At least a separate manual function should be available.
If I had to choose among auto only and manual only, I would take manual only.
The best tool that indeed combines levels adjust and color cast correction is the
Color Washer plugin.
Photo editing software review about levels adjust abilities.
Color cast correction
Color cast correction is an important feature you need to improve bad exposures.
It may be automatic, but a manual retouch of the automaticaly determined correction should be possible.
At least a separate manual function should be available, but with histogram support, else it is guesswork.
The best tool that indeed combines levels adjust and color cast correction is the
Color Washer plugin.
Photo editing software review about color cast correction features.
Hue and Saturation correction
The hue and saturation correction is mainly useful for the saturation part,
but the hue part can eventually be misused for some slight color cast corrections (!)
Some programs may only implement a saturation correction without hue-setting.
Photo editing software review of programs allowing saturation corrections.
Detail editing functions
Here we will have a look into the detail editing functions
i.e. the possibility to select a zone of a picture to copy and paste it,
or to apply a function selectively to this zone only (e.g. lighten it up).
Selecting a zone of a picture
If you want to lighten or darken only a zone of a picture instead of the complete picture, you need a selection tool.
Ideally you should also be able to define a "progressive border" of the selected zone (width to give in pixels),
where the effect you apply to the selected zone will be applied gradually less.
This is to avoid seeing a distinct boundary afterwards.
Photo editing software review of programs that allow zone selection.
| YES |
NO |
Zoner Photo Studio
(Rectangle, Ellipse, Lasso, Magic, with progressive border)
Paint Shop Pro
(Rectangle, Ellipse, Lasso, Magic, with progressive border)
Photoshop Elements
(Rectangle, Ellipse, Lasso, Magic, with progressive border)
PFS Photo Tools
(Rectangle, Ellipse, Polygon, Lasso, Magic)
Photophilia
(Rectangle, Ellipse)
Photo Brush
(Rectangle)
Ultimate Paint
(Rectangle)
|
|
Copying a zone to clipboard, pasting a zone from clipboard
A few photo editors are able to copy a selected zone of an image to the clipboard and to paste the content of the clipboard into an image.
Photo editing software review of programs that allow copying a zone to the clipboard and pasting from the clipboard.
Other photo editor features
Here we will have a look into a few extras that may be very useful at times.
Many extras that we will not mention here are available too of course,
some of them being rather unnescessary like emailing an image or setting a wallpaper.
When I say unnecessary I mean if you need to do it, you can easily do it without a photo editor.
Running Photoshop Plugins
Photoshop Plugins are a kind of sub-program from third parties you can run with a few other photo editors too, not only with Photoshop.
My prefered plugin is the
Color Washer that I use very often to enhance photos.
Photo editing software review of programs that accept Photoshop Plugins.
Running a batch process
Running a batch process means to apply the same treatment to a bunch of images automatically.
You define a list of tasks to execute and you run the batch process over all the pictures that are in a given directory,
may be hundreds of photos!
Batch processing is not the main role of photo editors, thus many photo editors come with rather limited batch processing abilities.
Two exceptions are
Zoner Photo Studio and
Photophilia.
The scenarios of Photophilia are a little more work to be saved,
but are more complete and convenient to re-use later than the saved presets of Zoner Photo Studio.
Photo editing software review of programs that can run batch processes.
Notes:
1. The information available in the numerous small tables above is also available more concisely in a few bigger tables in our
tabular photo editing software review.
2. The information in the Photo editing software review paragraphs above is given without any warranty.
3. The
Paint Shop Pro Version tested is version 5.
The currently available version is version 9 and features may be different.
