We used this excellent package to produce our wedding album. It consists of amazing features which are very simple to use. I cannot comment on the library features but understand that it can provide a system for organising your photos. I can only comment on the photo editor part of the package.
digitial imaging suite uses the usual windows interface with drop down boxes and quick links. There is a common tasks toolbar which can be displayed on the left of the screen. This consists of a number of handy features. ************************************** 1 Quick links a) digital library - quick access to photos stored on your computer b) create a photo collage - this gives you a range of templates for 7-20 photos on a page. You can quickly drop your photos in and would be good to use for a collage in a photo frame -a handy gift for grandparents, etc. c) projects - quick link to produce calendars, business cards,
postcards, flyers, albums ( provides themed backgrounds, eg baby, christmas, etc)
2. Autofixes Provides autofixes for colour and saturation, contrast, exposure and levels plus camera phone autofix. with a click of a button the software will automatically fix pictures that are too bright or too dark. Fine tuning is available in the touch up section
3. Touch up Range of touch up features: a)colour and saturation - if you want to fine tune these features - these options are also possible with a range of drag and drop tool bars which you can alter the contrast ratios or colours - blue, red and green filters separately b)exposure and lighting - add flash, change contrast shadows and highlights c) fix red eye - autofix or fine tune features available d)smart erase - i love this function - in one of our outdoors photo a bird had flown overhead leaving a bizarre shadow on my dress. simply click and draw a circle around the area you want to remove and it will fill it in with colour and texture from the surrounding area. even when you blow the pictures up quite big you wouldn't notice that you had fixed it. can also alter funny things that appear in the background e) blending brush - similar to above but you click on an area of colour you want to be copied then drag it down to the area you want it in. I personally find the smart erase quicker and produced better results e)unsharp mask - allows you to sharpen images - especially useful if you;ve used autofocus but feel the image could have turned out a bit sharper f) batch edit - quick fix the contrast, colour or levels of a number of photos at once using this feature.
4. Format a) rotate - with a click rotate right, left or custom - custom allows you to lay photos diagonally (or an angle of your choosing) on the page. b)crop canvas - remove annoying bits at the edge of photos - i found it sometimes difficult to preserve the aspect ratio - but it does give you guidance lines to illustrate the rule of thirds which is helpful c)straighten picture - another superb feature - you can correct a wonky horizon or correct if the doorway behind someone looks at a bizarre angle -very easy to use d)resize image - custom size your image to a size of your choosing e) flip - invert or reverse the photo - can give very interesting angles
5.Effects A range of effects including black and white, antique, negative, diffuse glow, can alter the red green and blue filters in a black and white photo separately. You can also produce sepia, watercolour and mosaics effects but this is done from the drop down boxes at the top of the page
6. Edges Range of soft, highlighted - choose a colour and width of your edge, designer, put different shapes or splashes around your photos - gives a lovely professional look and stops you getting bored of the same shape edge on every photo. Also includes frames and borders - these are themed frames such as baby or christmas edges
7. Add something Add text or shapes/lines. This is really helpful if you want to fill the whole page with colour. Select a square - fill your canvas, Then from the droip down panels fill with colour. It gives a huge choice of colours (I feel slightly too much choice!!) You can then place your photos on top of this coloured background.
*************** Overall The package also contains lots of handy tools, panoramic stiching, fill with colour or texture, centering the photo on the canvas, aligning photos vertically or horizontally.
We designed 20 pages of 16x12 prints using this package. If producing pictures of that size you will need to save them as jpegs to get them printed as the files become too large and memory intensive. We then had them printed by bonusprint and were delighted with the results!!! I'm sure almost anyone could produce wonderful pages of photos for albums or frames - makes great gifts. You can get great italian leather albums from parker photographics to slide pages of photos in
It comes with a helpful step by step manual - very easy to follow. It has really developed my interest in photography. You could easily spend a lot of time just experimenting and playing with ideas - great distortion and effects and the undo button comes in handy if you go wrong!!! Just be careful if you ahve lots of photos open as it can be very memory intensive - more a problem if you have an older computer
Conclusion All in all a great package - produces very professional results and easy and enjoyable to use.
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