Paintshop Pro X8

[birdboy]

Does anyone here use Paintshop Pro X8 for photoediting?

I do not have photoshop or elements mainly because of cost. My main photoediting up to now has been Lightroom and it will remain my main use. I now want to be able to create nightscapes and blend pictures. To get the best detail from the sky I will be using a tracker but the land part of the picture shows movement. To fix this I need to take non tracked images of the land and then blend the pictures together. I think I can do this in Paintshop Pro X8.

For the cost of PSP X8 compared to other packages it seems really good value, so does it lack in image quality? I have downloaded Photoshop Elements as a trail and it seems very limited. Anyone got experience of this type of software.

[Graham_of_Rainham]

Re: Paintshop Pro X8

I would have thought PSE would be more than capable of doing what you want. I have an old version and it does all the layers I want (did one with 11 layers once)

[johnzsv]

Re: Paintshop Pro X8

Hi John,

I have used Paintshop Pro but I have found that Photoshop Elements and the full program deal with highlights much better when editing a RAW image.

If you are using Lightroom you can do your RAW editing in there then the rest of the editing can ben done in either PS Elements or Paintshop. In Paintshop you have the advantage of being able to edit layers in 16 Bit whereas PS Elements it will be 8 Bit. The downside is that you end up with a TIFF file whereas editing RAW images in PS Elements you don't.

The other problem I found with Paintshop is that it can be very slow, and you can end up with the brush chasing the cursor! Other than those points Paintshop does a lot for you money.

Hope this helps rather than confuse!

Keep smiling!
John.

[birdboy]

Re: Paintshop Pro X8

I would have thought PSE would be more than capable of doing what you want. I have an old version and it does all the layers I want (did one with 11 layers once)

Thanks Graham The problem I find is that when photo folk refer to having edited in PS I never know whether that is PSE or the full expensive version. I have had another look at the trail version and it looked basic because I had it set to "Quick" look when I switch to "Expert" there seems more options and the selection tools seem to work more effective than the PSP.

[Imageryone]

Re: Paintshop Pro X8

I still use a really old PSE 2 version for this type of manipulation, once you get the hang of it, easy to use.Also has a few features deleted from the later versions, which is why I keep it.



A mix of four images to create the whole.

[birdboy]

Re: Paintshop Pro X8

Hi John,

I have used Paintshop Pro but I have found that Photoshop Elements and the full program deal with highlights much better when editing a RAW image.

If you are using Lightroom you can do your RAW editing in there then the rest of the editing can ben done in either PS Elements or Paintshop. In Paintshop you have the advantage of being able to edit layers in 16 Bit whereas PS Elements it will be 8 Bit. The downside is that you end up with a TIFF file whereas editing RAW images in PS Elements you don't.

The other problem I found with Paintshop is that it can be very slow, and you can end up with the brush chasing the cursor! Other than those points Paintshop does a lot for you money.

Hope this helps rather than confuse!

Keep smiling!
John.

This is very helpful thanks John. I do my RAW editing in LR5.7 for highlights shadows and noise and am unlikely to change. Ending up with a 16 bit Tiff file would be my preferred option for night sky images as my sky processing software, Star Tools, works with Tiff files.

I do find PSP X8 (trial) very slow on my i5 4 GB desktop as well.

I would like to be able to focus stack as well but still trying to find out if either PSE or PSP X8 can do this.

[birdboy]

Re: Paintshop Pro X8

I still use a really old PSE 2 version for this type of manipulation, once you get the hang of it, easy to use.Also has a few features deleted from the later versions, which is why I keep it.

I have an old version of PSP 7 which did most of what I wanted until recently. Trying out PSP X8 seemed like a new learning to do the same things I could do in the old PSP 7 so frustrating. I would have thought that it could do the same but they have just tucked it away in another part of the program only a teenager could find.

[Imageryone]

Re: Paintshop Pro X8

Bet you could find all the older stuff if you were 15

[DerekW]

Re: Paintshop Pro X8

Taking a side turn, have you considered GIMP, it is a free version of Photoshop, but totally independently written by open software people.

I used this when I could not run Photoshop or any of the regular photo editing applications.

You will be able to get a lot of support on the web, just be prepared to use Google search option.

Gimp runs on most operating systems.

[birdboy]

Re: Paintshop Pro X8

Taking a side turn, have you considered GIMP, it is a free version of Photoshop, but totally independently written by open software people.

I used this when I could run Photoshop or any of the regular photo editing applications.

You will be able to get a lot of support on the web, just be prepared to use Google search option.

Gimp runs on most operating systems.

Thanks Derek I will give it a try as whatever I choose will require a learning curve.

[AMc]

Re: Paintshop Pro X8

Another vote for GIMP.
I recently discovered that using Olympus Viewer 3 to output a TIFF gives more to work on in GIMP than the out of camera JPG so that's what I'm going to do to more advanced editing on images.

[Gwyver]

Re: Paintshop Pro X8

Has anyone used On1 Photo 10 - and is it any good?
It claims to link with Lightroom.
More info here: https://www.on1.com/

[maccabeej]

Re: Paintshop Pro X8

I use it quite regularly and there is a lot of support on how to use it. However there are things that are easier in PS (cloning and healing complex areas for one). I think you can get the effects module for free and I believe there is a trial for the full version.