Photo Editing Software Ratings: A Five Point Test For The Biggies
Photo editing is one of the most common uses of a computer system. Even though a number of people try their hands at photo editing, the results are not the same in every case. This is mostly because of poor software. You must check photo editing software ratings before you buy the license for software you want to use.
Here we try to rate some of the most commonly used photo editing software for the Windows platform. We shall rate the software on the basis of feature set, user interface, file type support, price and resources required to run a system. The ratings cover Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Fireworks (Formerly Macromedia Fireworks), Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo, Adobe Photoshop Elements and GIMP.
Features: No competition here. Adobe Photoshop is the undisputed ruler. It leaves almost everyone else behind. GIMP comes next because it is backed by a strong community which keeps on adding features. Fireworks and Corel Paintshop Pro Photo tie up for the third place and Adobe Photoshop Elements brings up the rear. Photoshop Elements is a stripped down version meant for home user so it is enough for any home user.
User Interface: Only if Adobe Photoshop CS3 had not been out, Corel Paintshop Pro might have outran it but the new changes in user interface in CS3 version make Adobe Photoshop again the best in the league. Paintshop Pro takes the second place easily beating Fireworks and Photoshop Elements. GIMP comes last because the lesser is said about its interface, the better it would be. The GIMP team needs to rewrite the entire UI. File type support: No, this is not about the usual gif and jpegs. We are talking about support of file types like Camera RAW. Adobe Photoshop has support for most of the common RAW and other camera native file formats. Corels product being meant particularly for photographers puts another good show followed by Fireworks and GIMP. Photoshop Elements can do with some more camera RAW support enhancements but you need plugins. Resources required by the software: This includes both the hardware and software required by the software Fireworks is the lightest and it needs no special dependencies. Corel Paintshop Pro is the second best. No dependencies and it runs on any moderately powered system as well. Photoshop Elements is the third as it needs a decent PC. GIMP comes next. Along with a decently powered PC, you have to install the GTK runtime. Moreover if you want to use the software properly you should consider getting another monitor. Photoshop brings the rear for a change. It needs a monster PC to run decently. Price: This is where GIMP beats all. It is free. Fireworks, Paintshop Pro Photo and Photoshop Elements are priced decently and Photoshop is priced at humongous rate of $999 for the highest version. With these photo editing software ratings in your mind, we hope that it becomes easy for you to choose the right photo editing software.
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