Corel's Paint Shop Beauty

Advantages: Affordable, massive range of tools, accepts many Photoshop plugins, easy to learn
Disadvantages: It's not Photoshop.

...I've been using Paint Shop Pro since around 1998/9, when PSP5 was out. Since then, it's been through many different upgrades, and I've learnt much about photo and image editing along the way. Until version 10, or Paint Shop Pro X to give it its proper title, the software was developed and sold by Jasc. From version 10 onwards, however, it has been part of the Corel family of software, alongside the likes of Corel Draw and, of late, Winzip. From version 11 onwards, the software gained the word 'Photo' in its title, becoming Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo XI. It's impossible to give a review that covers absolutely everything about a product like Paint Shop Pro. Certainly, I doubt there are many people in the world who could claim to use everything it has to offer confidently enough to give a worthwhile opinion. I'll try my best...

sexyjw 06.11.2007 · Read review
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Review of Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2

Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo IX

Advantages: less processor memary than photoshop
Disadvantages: There are never enough features!

...This software graphics product is one of the best alternatives to Adobe Photoshop CS3/ CS2. It has a similar layout and design if you are familiar with photoshop. There are many drawing features that this product has such as vector drawing, exporting images, normal shape and paintbrush tools. The product also comes equipped with features used to enhance photos by adjusting features such as brightness, contrast, grayscale, removal of red eyes etc. It also has some nice graphic based tools such as artistic effects / 3d effects / texture based tools. As with other similar products it supports the use of layers in images, swatches, transparent backgrounds, picture tubes and has a nice feature that removes backgrounds from image files. It is probably easier to use than photoshop and a great choice at a reasonable price....

serenhere 18.09.2007 · Read review
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Review of Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo XI

Great program for little money

Advantages: Great price compared to others, vast amount of tools, seemless editing
Disadvantages: Adds noise involuntarily

...After getting tired of the freebies Picasa and HP Photosmart I decided it was time to get myself a more intricate photo editor. I didn't know much about photo editing at the time but our computer came with a demo of X1, which was nearly 2 years ago. I liked the demo so I thought I would go buy Corel Paint Shop Pro X2. I paid about £25 for it in total to be shipped from america on ebay. Not bad, considering that other places and shops were selling it for anything up to £40. I was expecting the CD to come in a plastic DVD case meaning there would be room for an instruction manual. It actually came in a cardboard tyvek sleeve thing, meaning no instruction manual or tips and tricks. The back of the sleeve just stated the things you can do on the program, and gave a little bit on system requirements. When loading the CD, the menu...

andrewxox 24.07.2008 · Read review
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Review of Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2

If a serious hobby photographer this is for you

Advantages: loads of features,professional feel
Disadvantages: not for the casual user or the professional, suits the serious hobbiest

...Ive used the paint shop pro series for many years and,for my use, much prefer it to the top rated 'photoshop' . Photoshop is professional standard and has every feature you can imagine but for my use, (a lot of fun photography and a little professional work) paint shop is much better suited to my needs. Like many photo and WP packages you will never use all the features, the trick is finding the ones you need and becomming familier with them. This is made easy with the quickly mastered interface used by paintshop pro. This system was developed by Jasic and only recently sold to Corel and with their large buget and expanding outlook I was expecting big things from PPXI over previous versions and there are some good ones but on the whole I actually prefer version 7 for ease of use . It seems to me Corel have realised that 'photoshop...

coppinpr 13.04.2008 · Read review
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Review of Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo XI

Not rated but I like it

Advantages: Very flexible and powerful, lots of extras
Disadvantages: Sometimes crashes

...A couple of years ago I spent some time trying out various graphics and photo editing packages because I was interested in doing some web site design and you really can't do anything of any worth without decent software for images and pix. The package I settled on pretty much straight away was CorelDraw 8, which came with PhotoPaint 8. I've tried out several other packages since and for a while I found Fireworks from Macromedia to be a useful tool, but I soon gravitated back to Corel and I've found it can do pretty much everything I want from such a system. It's good at manipulating photos and some of the filters, effects and other tools are first rate. I've never come across anything that I couldn't find a way to do with PhotoPaint and despite a disturbing propensity for crashing, this is my graphics package of choice. Even...

dave27 17.03.2001 · Read review
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Review of Corel Photo Paint 6.0 Complete package

I've tried the rest - but I stick with the best

Advantages: very felxible, an array of tools, value for money
Disadvantages: not the easiest of programmes

...When we first got our home computer it came preloaded with MGI photosuite. Not a bad programme for a beginner and it certainly kept me entertained for some time. (My late father-in-law was over the moon with the picture I printed off for him. He originally held a 6lb carp in his hands - but by the miracle of technology it grew to 20lbs plus!!!) Within a short space of time I had more or less mastered everything MGI had to offer. I was eager to learn more. It wasn't until I returned to work that I met "Corel Photopaint". Now we are inseperable. It has even followed me home. I was amazed at the amount of tools it had to offer:- paint tools, image brushes, photo enhancers galore, the list is endless. Working out the basic jobs it could do was quite easy (having used a graphics package before), the more "experienced" tools took...

pepperjulie 20.08.2002 · Read review
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Review of Corel Photo Paint 6.0 Complete package

Painting Revolution..?

Advantages: It is quick.
Disadvantages: It is messy. Limited paint colours available.

...At the end of last month I moved into my new house in Hertfordshire. As I am taking a few months out of the workforce, I am overseeing the ginormous amount of work that needs to be done and am personally handling the painting of just about every room in the house. With this in mind, my thoughtful husband suggested that a Dulux PaintPod roller system would make lighter of these tasks for me. The TV advertisements certainly made it seem this way and so we set off intent on making our purchase. We bought our system in Homebase for £69.99, although I think it is possible to get them a little bit cheaper elsewhere. The paint that needs to be used with the pod comes in a specially shaped plastic container. I understand from the internet that there are about 35 colours to choose from, but a far smaller number were stocked in my local...

Cat199 21.08.2008 · Read review
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Review of Dulux PaintPod Roller System

Peeling Back the Paint

Advantages: Good supporting performances, great costume design and cinematography.
Disadvantages: Simplistic characterisation.

...is accompanied by tolling tubular bells. It is an effective score that suits the mood and tone of the film. "The Painted Veil" is a solid example of the heritage picture that features strong performances, confident direction and capable writing. It is a trifle overlong and is sometimes weighed down by its sense of self-importance. It plays as though everyone knows that what they are making is art and not entertainment. But there are moments when it combines the intimate and the epic to great effect. If you like the work of W Somerset Maugham and/or you like a good period movie, this could be right up your street. But bear in mind that to get the most out of the cinematography, you should watch it on a wide-screen TV....

afy9mab 14.04.2008 · Read review
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Review of The Painted Veil

Lift not the painted veil

Advantages: Stirring emotional historical drama. Breathtaking scenery.
Disadvantages: A little predictable.

...Somerset Maugham led an enviable life of travel and story-telling with many of his novels notorious for their foundation on real people and events. He wrote The Painted Veil in 1925, a novel which had to be revised at least twice to eliminate references to people that were still living. Such was the popularity of this book that it inspired three films; The Painted Veil (1934), The Seventh Veil (1957) and The Painted Veil (2006). I have seen the first two films many times and loved them both. So whilst browsing the DVDs in Tesco for something interesting to watch, I couldn't resist this the third adaptation. I was not disappointed. Set in the 1920s London, Shanghai and China with filming taking place on location in China itself, the scenery is breathtaking; the costumes wonderful and what struck me in particular was the historical...

MAFARRIMOND 16.09.2007 · Read review
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Review of The Painted Veil

Aluminium paint is chic .

Advantages: Cheap, easy to use, no need to thin
Disadvantages: Can rub off onto clothes etc.

...Made by good old ICI. Dulux was founded in 1931. The paint was originally developed to give the impression of polished stainless steel. 1 litre will cover up to 18 square meters, depending on the surface. This paint is thin, so will soak in easily. It does not dry to a hard wearing finish, so allow for it to be touched up - ooooh err Missus! Solvent based, so brush cleaning has to be done with turpentine substitute. This paint actually does contain slivers of aluminium. The only colour is of course aluminium. Apply by brush, although small areas can be done with a rag. Either way, I would recommend surgical gloves, Tins are metal, none of those useless plastic ones. Sizes of tins are 5 litre, 2.5 litre. and one litre. Other manufacturers make smaller tins. Will go over bitumen paint, not a lot else will. Apparently this...

smudgeybabes 02.03.2007 (06.03.2009) · Read review
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Review of Dulux Aluminium Paint