Although it has not been up and running very long, I have actually learnt a couple of things already, which should help me with my aeroplane photography. As far as I am concerned, setting this forum up was a good idea. Thank you all.
I hope the below is a bit of help for those who are new to digital photography and a bit concerned about forking out a lot of money for some software to process their digital photographs.
I have Photoshop 7 and with all its bells and whistles, can be a bit intimidating to use. As my camera, a Minolta Dimage Z1, only saves in jpeg format, Photoshop is a bit OTT for my needs. Instead I have been using FastStone Image Viewer 2.0.5. to process my photos for the web. (See link below). As a free download I was a bit dubious about what it would be capable of but having used it for the last six months or so I am well impressed. If you are not a RAW user, although FastStone handles Cannon and Nikon RAW, then this could be the image manipulator for you.
Having clicked on a thumbnail to open an image, if you move the cursor to the left of the screen, then a window opens with all the tools you need. Right click on the image also does the same. When you click one of the links a small window opens with two images and a few sliders on it. Move the sliders and the image on the right changes and there is a button to press for a preview of the changes in the full picture. If happy – click OK. As simple as that.
Once you get to know where everything is and what they do then this is a very good piece of software to improve your photographic images.
I also use Ability Photopaint, which is part of the ‘Ability Office Professional’ suite. On opening it looks very much like Photoshop and it has Curves, Levels, Histograms etc but is a very basic programme. I use it mainly for the Clone tool for cleaning up photographs I have scanned. I have it linked to FastStone so I can flick between the two.
I updated my 2.0.5 with the 2.20 Beta version yesterday and so far have had no problems but if you are new to this then I suggest the 2.15 version to start with.
The illustrations below are examples – before and after – which have been manipulated using FastStone.
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August 9, 2005 at 6:15 pm