Recommend a free package to try?

Chr1stof

Chr1stof

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Name
Chris
Edit My Images
Yes
I quite like using Picnik as its nice and simple to use and offers basic controls such as colour saturation, sharpness and exposure.

Is there free any non-online editors that offer these controls and are nice and easy while I learn more advanced techniques? I downloaded Gimp and Photoscape but there doesnt seem to be a exposure control (for when I mess up!) Also tried DPP that came with my camera, but again there is no exposure control.
Thanks :)
 
lightroom 3

free trial, lightroom does everything from basic importing adjustments to exposure, sharpness, grads.


basicaly it is the best bit of 'workflow' software and does the majoirty of things very very well, for anything more you need photoshop element or photoshop cs, anyhting will kick the arse off of picnic.


if you want free try gimp which has the majority of the tools of photoshop but with less user friendliness!
 
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DPP does have exposure control, however it has nothing in the way of workflow, whenever i used it it appeared to be very clunky (Seemed useful with lots of capability) but if you were workin lots of images it seemed horrible
 
Free trial of LR and PS
Personally I use PS CS5 because of Camera RAW. Some of the best software in the world for editing photos.
Nothing compares to it really.
 
I'm sure Gimp does have an exposure control, it's just callerd something else, probably levels, which is a much better way of ajusting the exposure than a single slider (curves give more control again) While some of these software's do seem daunting at first, it's usually not to difficult to learn the basics that you'll use every day.
A friend after 2 lessons on photoshop is now happily ajusting the exposure, the colours and cropping her pics to upload to the web, she's even doing some cloning, and not doing too badly for a beginner.
 
I use Gimp, it has an exposure control (not sure what its called), levels and curves. All under the colours menu. The fun thing is that exposure has a button for levels for fine tuning and levels a button for curves so you can fine tune that way if you wish.

Two filters in Generic called Erode and Dilate are worth checking out too. Help a little with blown highlights and massive underexposure.
 
Thanks for the replies, I do have CS3 but find it quite complicated to use which is why I liked picnik's simple sliders for now as its quick and easy.
I couldnt find exposure control in DPP, will ahve another look.
The reason I mentioned off-line editors was the time up/downloading large files. Not the end of the world, just a bit annoying.
Gimp is another I have struggled to get to grips with, but like you all say pracctice is the key. I was just looking for an easy short term solution while my skills (hopefully) improve!
 
It might be worth you looking for local classes, many community centers run various photo editing courses, or local colleges, failing that try your nearest camera club, somebody there will most lightly be helpfull enough to show you the basics. For photoshop theres loads of online tutprials (youtube etc) where you can watch the software being used and follow along yourself.
 
Of course DPP has Exposure control

DPP-Exp.jpg


There is also shadow and highlight control, maybe worth having a look at the manual

With DPP you can to all the adjustments on one image then copy those as a recipe and apply them to EVERY image in one go.
 
I saw "brightness" but thats not the same as exposure surely? I did have a play with brightness in DPP but it certainly had a different effect on the image as opposed to exposure in Picnik.
 
I shoot in Jpeg at the moment.
 
Brightness isn't the same as exposure in lightroom or photoshop (I don't use DPP) brightness ajusts the midtone lightness, exposure moves the white and black point as well.
 
I'm guessing you're a PC user, so if so you can ignore the rest of this. Right, ok, you're still reading so either you have no computer (so best to use pencils and crayons), or you've got a Mac. iPhoto comes bundled with every mac, but Aperture 3 link is really really good for everything I want from editing my images (exposure, white balance, brushes, highlights and shadows, sharpening etc.). Basically everything except the remove/replace skills of Photoshop, which I don't think should be part of photography really - well mine at least.
 
Is paint.net considered any good for beginner editing?

I have got that on my desktop but not really got into it that much. I have got a fair bit more time to myself recently so looking for something to keep me occupied lol.

I like taking pics of everything so that is why I have got the new(ish) camera and decent monitor to work with.
 
dpp has got exposure which gives you 2 stops either way. have you tried picasa its ok for basic photo editing.
 
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