Post Processing

sepplett

Hey Everyone!

I am not sure if this is the right place for my question, if not forgive me.

I am new to all this. Photography IS my passion and I would like to take it further. I take nice photos, but they don't pop like a lot of them I see here do. I know some of the pop is from post processing. I know NOTHING about it. Where can a find a GOOD PP to learn with that I can afford. PhotoShop is currently out of my budget. I have picasa and photoscape which came on my computer.

My camera also came with some stuff, which would be useful for RAW images, though I can't find any.

Any hints, tips, suggestions or advise would be Greatly appreciated. I would love nothing more to take my photography to a new level. But with PP I don't know where to even start.

BPerron

You can get corel paintshop... good program, a used copy can be had for like $50, can do a lot of what PS can do...its great for someone getting started...

It might help if you let us know what kind of photography you are interested in, as there are different PP ways for different types of photography.

Pupator

Picasa is a good and powerful tool for making global adjustments (changes that affect the whole image). It's a great place to start.

For local/selective adjustments (those changes that you only want to affect a certain part of the image) Paint Shop Pro is very, very good and can be had (as was mentioned) rather cheaply. It was my program of choice before...

For photography, what you should be aspiring to is not Photoshop, but Photoshop Lightroom. It's well worth what it costs. It excels in organization, global adjustments, and (more and more with each revision) is becoming quite good at local adjustments.

ziggy53

Since this appears to be a question about image processing software and editors, I moved this to the Finishing School which is all about software.

In addition to what has been suggested, PhotoShop Elements is pretty good and fairly inexpensive.

The GIMP is available for 8 bit processing and has many of the same capabilities for general editing as PhotoShop, and it's free.

http://www.gimp.org/

If you use Windows or Linux, RawTherapee is a nice RAW image converter and also processes 16 bit TIF and (8 bit) JPG files. (Olympus RAW files should be converted using VNG-4.) It has many powerful features but lacks layers and masks, for instance. It is also free. It makes a fairly good front end for the GIMP.

http://www.rawtherapee.com/

sepplett

BPerron wrote:

You can get corel paintshop... good program, a used copy can be had for like $50, can do a lot of what PS can do...its great for someone getting started...

It might help if you let us know what kind of photography you are interested in, as there are different PP ways for different types of photography.

I have always done and will do people. I love black and white, but I am comfortable there. I am branching out into different areas. Stuff........architecture, nature, etc.....while I see stuff I like, nothing POPS.......

sepplett

ziggy53 wrote:

Since this appears to be a question about image processing software and editors, I moved this to the Finishing School which is all about software.

In addition to what has been suggested, PhotoShop Elements is pretty good and fairly inexpensive.

The GIMP is available for 8 bit processing and has many of the same capabilities for general editing as PhotoShop, and it's free.

http://www.gimp.org/

If you use Windows or Linux, RawTherapee is a nice RAW image converter and also processes 16 bit TIF and (8 bit) JPG files. (Olympus RAW files should be converted using VNG-4.) It has many powerful features but lacks layers and masks, for instance. It is also free. It makes a fairly good front end for the GIMP.

http://www.rawtherapee.com/

Ziggy.......thanks so much for answering and the suggestions. I don't understand the RAW stuff yet. Supposedly I take in RAW, yet it automatically converts to exif when I open the camera program on my computer. I can't figure out how to get the RAW file or what I am doing wrong there. But that is another topic. I will check out your free suggestions and thanks for moving this topic to the appropriate folder.

Stephanie

BPerron

QUOTE=sepplett]I have always done and will do people. I love black and white, but I am comfortable there. I am branching out into different areas. Stuff........architecture, nature, etc.....while I see stuff I like, nothing POPS.......[/QUOTE]

Since you are talking about people...I would highly, highly recommend Kevin Kubota's Boot camp book...I have read a lot of photoshop and digital processing books and this has to be one of the best!!!! You can find it here http://www.amazon.com/Digital-Photography-Boot-Step-Step/dp/1584282436/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1254457320&sr=8-1



Lightroom is a great application, but still not cheap at all and it is limited in what it can do...I use a combo of LR and Photoshop on a regular basis...

sepplett

Brandon,

Thanks for the response. Is there a good tool to learning the image manipulation software? Or does one do best by trial and error?

BPerron

sepplett wrote:

Brandon,

Thanks for the response. Is there a good tool to learning the image manipulation software? Or does one do best by trial and error?

google whatever software you want to use...so if you use Corel Paintshop...google corel paintshop tutorial...before any real trial and error, I think you need to know the basic functions and how to use them and then you can begin your trial and error...

rsi1986

Give GIMP a try. It does a lot of what PhotoShop does, and it's free. Can't beat that. www.gimp.org