Re: filmscanners: PS 6.0 v. PS 5.0 LE v. Jasc Paintshop Pro 7.02

[Arthur Entlich <artistic@ampsc.com>]

I'll chime in here and agree with Rafe (did I just type that ;-)), and
numerous others and support the idea that you not only don't need PS
6.0, but you don't need PS at all.

Yes, I use it, because at the time when I started with it, (version 2.5)
it was vastly superior to most else on the market, and it came bundled
in a huge Adobe software package, and came as part of a scanner
purchase, no less!  PS has grown and has a great many bells and whistles
now, some of which I will never need or use.

However, in the meantime, many lesser known products have become much
more sophisticated, and some have nipped at the heels of PS for the last
several years.

As others have mentioned, JASC, Corel, which is now concentrating
heavily on image manipulation software, having bought out most of
Meta-Creations' product line, MGI, and others have come up with fine
products at much lower pricing.

Recent older versions of Photoshop are fine, heck, they are what the top
end people used only 6-12 months ago! And even Adobe recognized they
needed to come up with something between Photoshop Full and Photodeluxe,
which wasn't the quite crippled LE version.  Photoshop Elements has come
with rave reviews, and costs under $100 US, I believe.

I'm sure there are reviews of image programs in some of the magazines
which are worthwhile looking at, and most importantly, check for
specific features you need, and if you are a novice, look for support
groups to help you over the learning "curve".

Lastly, if you are a careful shopper, you might find programs like MGI
Photosuite available for free after rebate, although it isn't in the
same league as PS, it has some nice features and is easy to use. (I was
once speaking with the head sale guy from MGI by phone about some
problems they were having with their rebate system up here in Canada
(they are a Canadian company, but chose to use a US rebate service, and
it backfired badly for their Canadian clients).  One of the rebates
involved an "upgrade" program, so he was filling out some forms for me,
and asked me "what software are you upgrading from" and I said, "oh,
let's put down Photoshop", even he got a big laugh out of that.

Art

Raphael Bustin wrote:
> 
> On Mon, 9 Jul 2001, S. Matthew Prastein wrote:
> 
> > I'm new to all this, just getting my feet wet, and have a very basic
> > question about image processing software.  It's clear, from all the
> > content here, that PS, and in particular PS 6.0, is the Rosetta stone,
> > an essential professional tool for achieving image quality, and
> > uniformity, in publishing.
> 
> Photoshop can be mighty intimidating when you're
> just starting out.  Lots of us have been there.
> 
> No doubt several other competent packages can
> accomplish the same results, and almost always
> for less $$ than Adobe's latest.
> 
> The one BIG advantage with PS is that it's the
> program that sets the standard, and the terminology,
> for the rest of the pack.
> 
> One option you might consider is a pre-owned copy
> of an older PS version (say 4.x or 5.x) on eBay,
> which can be had for far, far less $$$ than the
> retail cost of PS 6.
> 
> FWIW -- and this is a minority opinion, for sure --
> you can do just fine without all the ICC color
> management stuff.  I still do nearly all of my work
> in PS 4.
> 
> rafe b.