 |
|
|
 |
 |
Image manipulation software
Many people use their computer to organise and enhance photos they have taken with their cameras and wish to share with the outside world (normally family back in the UK). Software companies have been quick to realise that many home users need to work with the images they have before they start emailing to everyone they know and have provided a wealth of tools to help them do just that.
In this article I am going to talk about some well known and not so well known software packages that you might find useful when dealing with photos or any other type of computer image. So whether it is a few photos for the family or you are wanting to make some graphics for a website or design Christmas/birthday cards to sell at a local market then read on. You may be surprised at the range of software out there and some of it is even free!!
I can’t possibly list all the software that is available so please accept my apologies if you have a favourite piece of software that is not mentioned in this article. Drop a message in the forum if you think people would benefit from your recommendations.
OK, so you have taken a lot of photos and want to share them with family and friends. You could just send them as they were taken, but then you might also want to get rid of certain parts of the photo or change the contrast. What program should you use?
If you have bought a digital camera or scanner, you will normally get an image editing program with it. These do vary quite a lot from good packages to pretty useless programs that won’t do what you need. If you feel that the program you have is not of much use, you might want to consider buying one of the following programs.
Microsoft Windows comes with a very basic piece of software for editing pictures called Paint. This is a very basic program that will allow you to change photos but is best for basic drawing functions. You can’t really perform a lot of the editing that you can on other programs so it is not much use if you want to start changing a photo to any great degree.
Still with Microsoft, they have recently released a ‘Beta’ version of a new image editing program called ‘Acryllic’. This is available on a free download from http://www.microsoft.com/products/expression/. Bear in mind that you will need a valid Microsoft passport (login) to get the program. I haven’t actually used it as yet – I am downloading as we speak- so can’t give any more information on it, but it sounds like it is geared towards the more serious photo editor so may be of use. Microsoft will probably charge when they do a full release so make sure you read the licence details carefully.
At the high end of the scale in image manipulation programs is the world famous ‘Adobe Photoshop’. This piece of software is the choice of graphic designers the worlds over and is used in high end publications. It is a great piece of software that can do just about anything you want. However the power of the software also comes with a very hefty price tag. Amazon.co.uk sell it for £455.99. I doubt that many home users could really justify this price tag. Luckily though, Adobe seem to have realized this and so have brought out a cut down version called Photoshop Elements; This retails on Amazon for the much more reasonable price of £58.99 and it is still a great package that should satisfy most of the normal users needs.
Another popular program is made by a company called ‘Jasc’ and is called ‘Paint Shop Pro’. This has many of the features of the Adobe programs and retails for around
If you are on a tight budget and want to get a program that offers the flexibility and power of the Adobe or Jasc products but not have to pay anything, there is a solution. That solution is to go ‘open source’. Open source software is released by developers in a form where other developers can see the ‘source code’ (the program itself) and work on developing new features to release. They are usually released on what is known as the GPL license which means that the program is freely distributable and best of all free. There are many programs that may be useful to the home user (have a look on www.sourceforge.net) but when it comes to image manipulation the one that really sets the standard is ‘The Gimp’. Don’t be put off by it’s name. The Gimp is a powerful program that holds it’s own against other expensive image programs. To download ‘The Gimp’ go to www.gimp.org and make sure that you download the Windows version if that’s what you use (for the Mac user, you can also use the Gimp if you have OS X). It may be a little more tricky to use but with a bit of perseverance s a great package that is in continual development and has some great documentation to help (see http://members.home.nl/m.weisbeek/gimp/ for a simple beginners tutorial).
Also of interest is the ‘Corel’ range of programs which are often packaged with digital cameras and scanners. Corel’s programs are often very simple to use and can be great for the novice who doesn’t need the facilities of the higher end of image manipulation programs.
I hope this has given you an idea of the different programs available to help you work with the pictures you want to share. In the next article I will be looking at how to do some simple things with images such as getting rid of red eye in your photos. I will do this using various programs so that whatever you use you should be able to get some good results with your prized memories of France.
Until then,
Richard Cleverley
|
|
||
 |
||
|
||
|
 URL site map |
About us |
| Save to : |
