Valentinian
Leading Member
Could you please suggest a software alternative to Photoshop ?
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Photoshop alternative
- Thread starter Valentinian
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thebigA
Well-known member
There are many alternatives - I myself favour Paintshop Pro. Most have a month's free trial, try some and then choose the one you prefer. Try Gimp (free), Affinity, ACDC and lots of others.
Brian Chichester
Senior Member
Paintshop Pro does practically all that PS does, at a fraction of the cost. I don't rate the program's RAW developer though, and use Silkypix for Panny and Capture NX-D for Nikon (both free).
Dr. Noodle
Senior Member
Photofiltre studio x
DaveyB
Senior Member
I’m more than happy with DXO Photolab
You should switch to the "Retouching" forum. There you will get a lot of useful answers.
danieljcox
Senior Member
DXO PhotoLab for me.
beameup
Forum Enthusiast
I've been using Photoshop Elements for about a decade. It's a scaled-down version of Photoshop that focuses on photography. I've got Topaz and NIK plug-ins that work just fine with Elements (except NIK HDR Efex).
I use Olympus Viewer to convert ORF files to TIFF as a first-step in PP.
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glassoholic
Veteran Member
This one....
As a matter of interest did you supply the National Geographic cover shots processed by you with DXO PL or did they ask for RAWS and do it themselves?
windmillgolfer
Forum Pro
Seconded re PSE and Nik Suite. Note, Nik Suite used to be free when Google owned it. DXO now own it and charge for it. Worth shopping around on PSE, Amazon sometimes have offers.
A free and popular alternative to PSE is Faststone - comprehensive and similar to PSE/ Paintshop.
Affinity Photo is very powerful and has variants for iOSand MAC, plus Windows. A steep learning curve if migrating from application but, in any event, if you’re starting from scratch any application will take a long time (years) to master.
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Stuart
Latest uploads
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dieselgolfer/
FZ330 images https://www.flickr.com/photos/dieselgolfer/albums/72157659823425652
FZ80/82 images https://www.flickr.com/photos/dieselgolfer/albums/72157698013761104
TZ60 images https://www.flickr.com/photos/dieselgolfer/albums/72157642261079494
Aurora Borealis https://www.flickr.com/photos/dieselgolfer/albums/72157663549812064
A free and popular alternative to PSE is Faststone - comprehensive and similar to PSE/ Paintshop.
Affinity Photo is very powerful and has variants for iOSand MAC, plus Windows. A steep learning curve if migrating from application but, in any event, if you’re starting from scratch any application will take a long time (years) to master.
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Stuart
Latest uploads
http://www.flickr.com/photos/dieselgolfer/
FZ330 images https://www.flickr.com/photos/dieselgolfer/albums/72157659823425652
FZ80/82 images https://www.flickr.com/photos/dieselgolfer/albums/72157698013761104
TZ60 images https://www.flickr.com/photos/dieselgolfer/albums/72157642261079494
Aurora Borealis https://www.flickr.com/photos/dieselgolfer/albums/72157663549812064
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jimrpdx
Senior Member
https://www.cyberlink.com/products/photodirector-ultra/features_en_US.html
I use v.8 of this, many nice features and a price I can manage. Looks like v9 is on closeout now 50% off..
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JimR nr.Longview WA.. e-M10ii GX1 &c - https://granitix.blogspot.com
I use v.8 of this, many nice features and a price I can manage. Looks like v9 is on closeout now 50% off..
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JimR nr.Longview WA.. e-M10ii GX1 &c - https://granitix.blogspot.com
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beameup
Forum Enthusiast
There are also a lot of free plug-ins for Photoshop/Photoshop Elements. You might still be able to find the Google version of NIK Collection online (v.1.2.11). Free updates are now only available with the DxO version, they do not support the older versions. Topaz plug-ins are outstanding, but are not free. I'm still using Elements 7 and it works just fine.
danieljcox
Senior Member
Those Nat Geo covers we’re from the days of shooting film. Late 90s early 2000’s. No digital unfortunately.
I use Elements 7 but can't get it to recognise NIK Collection as a plug-in.
glassoholic
Veteran Member
Thanks!
Englishman in France
Senior Member
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I really like Affinity. It is cheap, you can install it on multiple computers, and it does pretty much everything that my version of Photo Shop Elaments 9 (PSE9) can do and more.
I used to have the same workflow as posted by Beameup, which is to use OV3 to generate a tiff and PSE9 to edit it. I do like Olympus colours and OV3 applies all the in camera settings for noise reduction and sharpening as well as native lens corrections for distortion and CA. So this workflow has some advantages if you have PSE and time to spare.
I changed from PSE9 to affinity photo, because I was fed with having to convert RAW files to tiff. PSE9 did not support my camera RAW files as it was too old and no longer maintained. You can find some comparisons between PSE and affinity photo on YouTube. I think it is a very good editing program for an amater who doesn't want to invest to much money.
The only disadvantage with Affinity photo over PSE is the lack of good books. There are some excellent videos on YouTube, but the only English book available at the moment is not to my taste. This is where PSE wins over Affinity photo. There are books galore to explain how to do things on PSE, many of which are very good and cheaper than the one book available for Affinity photo. But if you already know how to use PS, then moving to Affinity Photo is not so hard with the help of heir YouTube videos.
Good luck on your choice!
I used to have the same workflow as posted by Beameup, which is to use OV3 to generate a tiff and PSE9 to edit it. I do like Olympus colours and OV3 applies all the in camera settings for noise reduction and sharpening as well as native lens corrections for distortion and CA. So this workflow has some advantages if you have PSE and time to spare.
I changed from PSE9 to affinity photo, because I was fed with having to convert RAW files to tiff. PSE9 did not support my camera RAW files as it was too old and no longer maintained. You can find some comparisons between PSE and affinity photo on YouTube. I think it is a very good editing program for an amater who doesn't want to invest to much money.
The only disadvantage with Affinity photo over PSE is the lack of good books. There are some excellent videos on YouTube, but the only English book available at the moment is not to my taste. This is where PSE wins over Affinity photo. There are books galore to explain how to do things on PSE, many of which are very good and cheaper than the one book available for Affinity photo. But if you already know how to use PS, then moving to Affinity Photo is not so hard with the help of heir YouTube videos.
Good luck on your choice!
beameup
Forum Enthusiast
I install each plug-in separately and only install those that I like (CEP & SEP).
I don't know which "version" of NIK you are using: original, Google, or DxO.
Also, there is a 32bit version and a 64bit version.
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