Art Commenting on the new Paint Shop Pro 8

[Circ]

[i][size=1]In this article PS=Photoshop PSP=Paint Shop Pro[/size][/i]

I've never been a fan of Photoshop and never will be. It's price is overly prohibitive (How many of you actually paid for your copy?) and you can't even half-experience it with the demo version. You can't edit/save masks and selections...

Anyway, back onto subject. I've recently acquired a copy of PSP8 and I'm quite impressed. It has acquired many of
the most important tools it lacked (A background eraser, for exemple, which I actually consider MORE performing that PS') while yet improving it's advantages. Several changes I'm not happy about, though, for various reasons:

They tried too hard to mimick photoshop. Doing this they both lost what made the program special and rendered it less user-friendly.

-Placing the Tool Options palette atop the screen and default-hiding the actual options: It took me [i]3 days[/i] to correct the Magic Wand's Tolerance! (PS mimicking, [i]especially[/i] the brushes' presentation *gag* You have to notice the little "follow" button at the extreme-right of the screen.)

-Changing the menu presentation: Why did they need fancy menus? I find it ridiculous. They should just have stuck to "standard windows menus" (I've been told you can customize this, but have yet to find how)

-Changing ALL the the specific file types! Brushes, gradients, textures, masks now all have to go through complex conversion. And the program can't even load most psp7 files correctly. (Painfully long when you have more than 500 brushes and 40 masks. i haven't found a simple to do it.)

-The program is definitely memory-eating. We have a good computer, but on print-quality pictures, even moving a layer can take painfully longs, and the program is much less stable than it used too (It crashed 4 times on me this week, while it almost never crashed by itself before!)

On the other hand, the program is definitely more powerful than ever! Scripts, actual layer groups (Something I've been waiting for), saving tool customizations, fine text edition and powerful vector tools (Something I have yet to explore, though) are included, multiplying the versatility of the program by 100.

[Semjaza]

For print quality pictures... I'm assuming you mean images between 150 and 300 pixels/inch? If so that really sucks as that's what I have to work in a good deal of the time.

I was thinking of picking this up since the price obviously is a big difference... the new CS version is like $650 by itself. That and PSP just does some things better than Photoshop (although I never liked PSP's layers support).

But that really messed up my plans. I don't want to bother if that's an issue. I get Photoshop through my cousin's work, so I guess I can stick with that and PSP 7 in the meantime.

[Hittokiri Zero]

[quote]I've never been a fan of Photoshop and never will be. It's price is overly prohibitive (How many of you actually paid for your copy?) and you can't even half-experience it with the demo version. You can't edit/save masks and selections...[/quote]

When doing actual web design it's easy to get by without half the features in PSP and Photoshop, I used the trial version of Photoshop 5.0 for a while and it's still easily possible to make the same things in photoshop 7.0 or PSP 7.0 it just takes longer and more work/effort.

As for PSP 8 i've never used it I just through PSP 7.0 aside and stuck with Photoshop 7.0 whatever program you start with is whatever program you will like better. Although atleast when comparing photoshop 7.0 to PSP 7.0 Photoshop has been proven to be the stronger of the two programs. Generally this holds true with many Adobe based products... But considering the fact PSP 8 is newer than Photoshop 7.0 it only makes sense for it to be better than Photoshop 7.0. Although I will say that I enjoyed using PSP's vector tools much better than Photoshop's pen tool. Also the navigation in photoshop 7.0 is a pain when compared to it's predecessor 6.0. Many graphics programs seem to be having this problem if you ask me -____-. I'll comment more later after i've used PSP 8.0 and after I finish studying for school ='|.

[Circ]

Actually, you know, I wasn't even aware there was now a 7.0 version of Photoshop.:blush:

For your info, when you get into some of the stranger stuff I've been doing, you get to use quite a lot of the features. Though there are still some I'm not even ure how they're best used (Black/White point, for exemple, though it might just be because I haven't yet [i]needed[/i] it.)

Anyway, Photoshop [i]is[/i] powerfull (especially, I've heard, if you also use Photoshop Elements). This post was mostly my personnal experience of it and PSP.

The memory thing is not unique, PS IS memory hungry on my comp too, though both program are quite more than Illustrator (Which is probably THE reason PS's vector support is not very good)

[QUOTE]whatever program you start with is whatever program you will like better. [/QUOTE]

True, true. When I first used PS, my big piss-of was that the zoom with the roulette was inverted :laugh:

[Semjaza]

It's past 7.0 already. CS just came out very recently.

[James]

[color=#707875]Well, I use Photoshop at school and Paint Shop Pro at home. Both the most recent versions.

The truth is that I like both; Photoshop can do some amazing stuff, though very few people can unlock its potential. Paint Shop Pro is far more accessible to the lower end, but it is also not an easy program to "master".

In my opinion, Photoshop hands more things to you. That is, if you have Elements and EyeCandy and all that stuff...you can make gorgeous work with little effort.

In some ways, PSP is more barebones...it's more focused on photographic effects and most of its more expansive filters are a little more plain and simple. So in other words, I think PSP demands more creativity from the user; it's a bit more like MS Paint, in the sense that you need some raw skills to get the most out of it.

For me, I use PSP because a) it's cheaper and b) I find it more intuitive. I hate -- and have always hated -- the interface for Adobe products. Whether it's InDesign, Photoshop, GoLive or whatever else...I am unconvinced that Adobe knows how to create intuitive menus. I find them clunky, awkward and often they seem to require dozens of steps to do something that takes only two or three in PSP. I just find most of that stuff unnecessary.

And, especially with web-related graphics, PSP seems to be designed with more easily-accessible customisation and optimisation features in mind. And since most of my graphics are web-related, that works for me.

So really, I don't think either one is "better". It just depends what your skills are, what kind of work you're doing and which type of interface you prefer.[/color]