Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)I recently received the assignment from my boss to evaluate the various digital photography/image editing programs in the ~$$$ price range. Included were:
- Adobe Photoshop Elements 2.0
- Microsoft Digital Image Pro 9.0
- Ulead PhotoImpact 8.0
- Jasc Paintshop Pro 9.0
My review centered around three criteria: image mainpulation, advanced design and photo effects, and suitability for making web graphics. I spent a total of 16 hours on the various programs performing a pretty intensive evaluation in order to determine which product to select for our business. (We needed to purchase a large site license and so there was a lot of $$$ at stake.)
I will tell you that, much to my surprise, PhotoImpact came out on top - not just overall but in each of the three areas individually, as well. I say "to my surprise" because it's definitely the underdog. It doesn't have the kind of sensationalism that the other seem to have, and you don't see it advertised all that much. But it's definitely the champ.
I found PhotoImpact and Paintshop Pro the easiest to use when it came to digital photography features. (Photoshop Elements was far too difficult for business use, and Digital Image Pro far too simplistic, in my opinion.) But PhotoImpact takes the cake in this area because its drag-and-drop orientation is very straightforward.
When it comes to the higher-end design features, PhotoImpact was the clear winner. It supports Adobe's plug-in architecture, so all of the cool filters you can get for Photoshop (and elements, for that matter) are compatible with PhotoImpact. But PhotoImpact gives you a much greater degree of control over customizability than Photoshop Elements, the no. 2 contended in this second area, in my opinion. Once again, it's very easy to create some spectacular effects: There's built-in sophisticated vector drawing (which none of the other evaluated products have), as well as 3D text with some outstanding effects.
And, lastly, in the area of web graphics, PhotoImpact came in tops with Paintshop Pro following second. PhotoImpact has a great system for compressing GIFs, plus it includes a GIF animation application that's really sweet.
Anyway, I hope this helps all you image editing shoppers. Wish I had seen this sort of review upfront; it would have made the decision much easier for me,
Click Here to see more reviews about: PhotoImpact 8
98/W2K/WME/XP
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