The first thing you notice about Paint Shop Pro PHOTO X2 Ultimate is the very clear layout. Menu bars on the top, features on the left, folders of images on the bottom and the image in the centre of the screen. The right hand side allows for more advanced features. Corel have gone for the in-vogue approach of a neutral grey background (or graphite as they call it) to prevent distractions - and it works. The images seem to stand out from the program which is what you want – a separation of tool and image. Corel however, don’t force you to use this approach as you can choose the old light background. They have also opted to go for the uncluttered, context sensitive approach so that you are not overwhelmed with lots of floating palettes and toolbars. It is obvious that the design team have thought this out well and tried to imagine themselves working with their own photographs. They have done an excellent job.
The Ultimate suite includes :
Certified
for Windows Vista - Paint
Shop Pro Photo X2 Ultimate is now fully certified
for Windows Vista, the highest certification of
support for that operating system, meeting
compatibility standards for ease-of-use, better
performance, and enhanced security.
Camera Raw Support - Paint
Shop Pro Photo X2 Ultimate supports more than 250
raw camera formats, making it easier for users to
edit photos taken with the most popular camera
models.
Creative Content Pack - The
Creative Content Pack includes 150 brand-new,
custom-made photo frames, photo edges and Picture
Tubes that enable users to express their creativity
with unique edges and custom graphics, including
square or oval frames, modern or classic frames,
mats or photo edges, or a variety of other
styles.
With increased raw camera support and new creative
content, Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 Ultimate is
excellent value for consumers interested in
managing, editing and being creative with their
digital photos,” said Petter Nordwall, director of
product management, Corel. “Our users will find
increased depth of functionality in Paint Shop Pro
Photo X2 Ultimate that enables them to grow as
their skills and knowledge progress. Every
photography enthusiast will find the latest
photo-editing technologies and creative tools in a
single purchase.
Corel
Paint Shop Photo X2 Ultimate bonus items
Corel
Painter Photo Essentials 4 - Photo
enthusiasts can now convert photos into digital
artwork in three easy steps. Using the unique
Auto-Painting palette, users can create a
stunningly realistic work of art including
paintings and drawings.
PhotoRecovery for Digital Media
- When
users think their digital content might have been
lost forever, PhotoRecovery can recover images,
movies and sound files from accidentally
reformatted memory cards. It is compatible with
virtually all media card formats, including SD,
miniSD, microSD,
CompactFlash I and II, Memory Stick, MMC, xD,
SmartMedia and Microdrive.
Background Remover - An
unwanted background image can ruin what would
otherwise be a perfect photo. In three simple
steps, the Background Remover isolates part of a
background in an image and removes it, allowing the
user to replace it with a complementary image. With
the Background Remover, users can preserve image
details that were once impossible to mask precisely
by preserving fine, semi-transparent details such
as strands of hair and wisps of smoke, as well as
the detail that is found between larger objects,
such as the sky seen between tree branches.
Flash Drive - A 2 GB
USB Flash Drive makes it easier for users to backup
and transfer photos, videos and other files from a
PC. Includes plug-and-play compatibility with any
PC.
Corel have provided a fully fledged suite here that
gives the home-user and hobbyist entertained with
all the tools anybody could ever need.
All of
the features you expect from a comprehensive image
editing program are here including some exciting
new features that will make your images standout
from the crowd:
Express
Lab —This
lets you quickly view all the photos in a selected
folder, one at a time. You can also delete photos,
add star ratings, and perform basic editing tasks,
such as cropping, straightening, removing
blemishes, and fixing red-eye. This rapid-edit mode
lets you quickly complete the first cut of photos
before doing more detailed work on a select few. I
tried this with a folder containing a few hundred
photographs and within a few minutes I had selected
the shots I wanted, mostly fixed and rated.
Impressive. I recommend you use this to do a basic
pre-selection.
HDR
Photo Merge — HDR
(High Dynamic Range) Photo Merge, a new File menu
command, lets you do the seemingly impossible when
shooting high-contrast scenes such as sunsets or
interior shots with bright windows. By shooting one
photo for the shadows (dark areas) and another for
the highlights (bright areas), you can combine both
to show the full range of detail. This effect is
not possible to achieve otherwise with any digital
or film camera. The only other way to do this is to
use neutral density filters, but the best quality
ones cost a lot, and then you have to fiddle around
putting them on the camera. This is a great option
for dawn and dusk landscape shots where you have a
very broad dynamic range, usually too much for the
image sensor to capture.
Save
for Office and Copy Special commands
— When you use photos in documents, presentations,
or Web pages, they often are much larger than they
need to be. Photos that are too large can cause
bloated document file sizes, slow performance, and
even printing and sharing problems. The new Save
for Office command lets you resize and select an
appropriate file format for the active image. This
is a welcome feature which if anything raises the
awareness of file bloat.
It is clear that Corel have invested a huge amount
of time in modernising and simplifying what was an
already simple to use program. The new features are
well thought out and reflect the way the modern
digital photographer works.
The modern buzzword for digital image photography
is workflow. Some of the high end, professional
programs have had this for some time and you can
see why. You take hundreds of photographs – great
as it hasn’t cost you a penny. Now what do you do
with them?. At least with film, all you did was put
your 24 or 36 exposure film in the post and a
couple of days later you received your prints.
Now you have hundreds of photographs to handle. A
good workflow technique coupled with a good program
will save you hours of work. This cannot be
underestimated. Corel have done a super job with
workflow. I can imagine the workflow mantra being
repeated by the programmers trying to include this
at the heart of X2 and I congratulate them on their
splendid efforts.
If you want to do simple things quickly, this is
the package for you. If you want to grow your
skills, this suite has all you need. I have only
touched on the basics, with the added option now of
converting your images into digital artwork with
Painter Essentials 4, and a photo recovery
provision coupled with two giga-byte usb pen this
is definitely money well spent.
Corel
Paint Shop Pro PHOTO X2 gets the following
ratings:
Value
for money:
10/10
Quality
of results:
9/10
Ease
of use:
10/10
Features:
10/10
Ultimate Review