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After several years swimming through the seas of Corel’s Painter and Adobe Photoshop, seeing a product like Photo Album 4 brings back a great deal of memories, and the reality that hard core digital editing is not for everyone. While high end graphics applications are incredible, for the casual enthusiast these behemoths of the digital divide can be untamable monsters to the unsuspecting. If all you need to do is download photos from your digital camera and perform some basic editing on your captured moments, there are certainly easier to use applications for the beginner.
With that in mind, Paint Shop Photo Album may come as a real relief. Clearly from the design, implementation, interface and performance, the target audience for this application is the end user with modest needs, but not modest results. Photo Album 4 manages well as both a basic editor and a way to download photos to your computer.
However, Windows XP contains within it a fairly decent organizational system for photos. Plus, with the advent of the new Digital Plus and Windows Media Player Series 9, much of the functionality is already present in Windows, even if in a modest form with regards to photos. Where Photo Album fills in the blanks left by Windows comes down to ease of use, editing features and the ability to burn Video CD’s.
While Windows has certainly beefed up its ability to organize photos, Photo Album adds a bit more muscle. This is accomplished by a more sophisticated database which can make the process of keeping track of photos less time consuming. If one is a heavy duty photo enthusiast, I could see where having this level of cataloging and retrieval could be a real asset.
The digital editing elements of Photo Album are pretty basic, but for those new to editing, they certainly encompass the needs of those just starting out in digital photography. Such features common to consumer level photo editing like red eye removal and the new “Thinify” tool are designed with those needs in mind. And this is certainly no small accomplishment considering that photo editing and organizing can be daunting.
If downloading photos from a camera seems to be beyond you, Photo Album 4 makes it as simple as one, two, three. Just plug your camera into your USB port and literally the appropriate screen pops up and your photos can be dragged to the location of your choice with amazing ease.
For new users, I can see where functionality this easy will be much appreciated. And there is much here to recommend the application with that in mind. All one has to do is pull it up, and there you are.
The simplicity of the program is not confined to its looks. The help menus, animations and access to them are plentiful. The program literally hands out answers in a format that is neither too intimidating, nor too simplistic. Jasc has wisely given Photo Album a look that is both sophisticated and functional without being cute.
One of the things I absolutely hate in consumer software are cute buttons and menus. There is nothing more irritating than working with a program that looks as if it were designed for small children. The ring of dummied down sound effects, odd windows and too clever buttons are just confusing. The one thing a new user needs more than anything is an application that can conform to the conventions of Windows. I don’t foresee too many adults being happy with a program that looks as if it were designed for the Teletubbies set.
Fortunately, Jasc has always created lower priced applications that do not insult your intelligence. In fact, Jasc’s Paint Shop Pro is something of a standard among many digital enthusiasts. In many ways Photo Album keeps that tradition of high quality and user friendliness alive and well.
Planned for a release date soon, Jasc will be releasing the much anticipated Paint Shop Pro 8. You can download the beta version from their web site to get a feel for it sooner. As always, I do suggest whenever running any beta software to back up your system and save any files on your hard drive should the unexpected happen. Although Jasc’s products are solid, don’t take chances with your data.
As planned, Photo Album 4 will integrate tightly with the new Paint Shop Pro. Seeing this as a part of a larger system, Photo Album can work as an organizational tool, and a bit of a bridge to an application with a richer tool set for photo manipulation. Much like Ulead’s Photo Impact 8, which right now is Jasc’s closest rival in the market for well made low cost software that has the core feature set of Photoshop for a fraction of the price, Jasc is clearly placing a great deal of emphasis on using photo editing with digital cameras as a way to bring together two feature sets. In this case, photo organization and digital editing.
If you consider the core audience for this application and the quality of it, there is much to recommend Photo Album 4. Although this application does not support Windows 95, and as time goes by fewer and fewer new applications will, I do see this as a must have for Windows 98 SE users and those utilizing systems that do not have the photo functionality of Windows XP. Those new to photo editing cannot go wrong with this application. Considering that so many digital cameras come bundled with such weak photo editing applications, the need for a program like this becomes obvious. If you are totally new to both digital photography and the PC, this is an excellent starting point. The added advantage here is that if you wish to go further, you can do so without having to jettison Photo Album. Due to its integration with the soon to be released Paint Shop Pro, one can grow the application. As ones’ needs and abilities expand, one can add to it by adding Paint Shop Pro. For heavy duty digital photographers who need a way to catalog vast numbers of images, this may be the most economical way to do so. Regardless, this is an application new users may want to know much better.
Naturally, you can go higher. I do suggest at least 256 MB of RAM and a solid processor that can handle heavy duty use. With the shift of applications towards XP, this application may be far faster on that system than others, or at least Windows 2000.
Talk to Kurt in Graphics Unleashed Forums
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