Software Help Please!

chrispf007

With my use of Smugmug, my 6 year old daughter and the new responsibility of digitizing my whole family's photos. Some of which are from as early as 1900ish (there aren't many). I have found myself searching for a DAM and a photo editor. It would be nice if it was the same package or at least has the ability to link to an external app to create a smooth workflow.

My hardware is a little in the lacking side, my computer of choice lately is my new to me ibook G3 800 with 640 meg RAM. My desktop is a shuttle system with 1 gig RAM and a 900 AMD processor.

I have been manually managing my pics in folders or with the software that came with camera and using photoshop elements 3 (the workflow stinks). I am playing with the lightroom beta on my pc, but the ibook won't handle either lightroom or aperture.

Ideally, i would like something that runs on both machines, but not a must. I am also considering hardware upgrades.

my main use will be retouching, cataloging and uploading to smugmug.

Suggestions?? recommendations??

Pupator

I suggest Corel's PaintShop Pro (which I think is called Paint Shop Pro Photo now?) to everyone. I find that this program can do 99% of what Photoshop can do (I say that to be nice, I'll still looking for the 1%) at 1/5 of the price. It also has some organization options that might be what you're looking for.

Unfortunately, it is not an Apple-friendly program, so you could only use it on the shuttle.

Also, no matter what you decide - get more RAM. Put as much RAM as you can afford in whatever computer you're going to use for photo editing. It will make all the difference.

chrispf007

Thanks
I came across it in my search, now I will go back and give look see. Regarding upgrading my RAM, unfortunetley I have maxed out both machines. It is probably time to upgrade, but the budget is telling to sit tight for a bit.

Anything else that I should consider?

Pupator wrote:

I suggest Corel's PaintShop Pro (which I think is called Paint Shop Pro Photo now?) to everyone. I find that this program can do 99% of what Photoshop can do (I say that to be nice, I'll still looking for the 1%) at 1/5 of the price. It also has some organization options that might be what you're looking for.

Unfortunately, it is not an Apple-friendly program, so you could only use it on the shuttle.

Also, no matter what you decide - get more RAM. Put as much RAM as you can afford in whatever computer you're going to use for photo editing. It will make all the difference.

Pupator

chrispf007 wrote:

I came across it in my search, now I will go back and give look see. Regarding upgrading my RAM, unfortunetley I have maxed out both machines. It is probably time to upgrade, but the budget is telling to sit tight for a bit.

This I understand. I ran PSPX on a computer with very similar specs to your shuttle and the 1GB was enough (not blazing, but enough). PSPXI is out now and, though I use it, I'm on a much faster system. I don't know how it would perform on a machine of that speed, but I would imagine it would be fine.

claudermilk

In that situation, I'd start my research with PS Elements and iView. Both are cross-platform and not terribly expensive.

Pupator

claudermilk wrote:

In that situation, I'd start my research with PS Elements and iView. Both are cross-platform and not terribly expensive.

Can you buy one PSElements disc and liscense that works for both platforms/is legal on two computers? Wouldn't you still have to buy two versions of the software?

(Though, even if you do, there is learning curve value in having the same program on both computers.)

kini62

Pse 5
Do you know that PSE 5 has a direct link to smugmug?

It's waaaaaayyyyyy cool

Select the photos, hit the share button, go to send to smugmug and away you go.

Andy and the smugmugh crew managed to do a great thing here. And it works perfectly. The easiest way to get you photos to smugmug.

Gene

chrispf007

Well, that just may have made my decision for me. I am not crazy about the workflow the organizer seems limited and no mac version. I wish PE5 shipped with bridge. I will have to play more with the demo and demo idimager.

kini62 wrote:

Do you know that PSE 5 has a direct link to smugmug?

It's waaaaaayyyyyy cool

Select the photos, hit the share button, go to send to smugmug and away you go.

Andy and the smugmugh crew managed to do a great thing here. And it works perfectly. The easiest way to get you photos to smugmug.

Gene

David_S85

As this conversation is leaning towards software, I am moving it to that forum.