Review of Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo XI
Corel has released Paint Shop Pro Photo XI, and there is no doubt about it, it’s fabulous. We look at how some of its features can be used in combination to make masterpieces of your images. Our editor, Shelton Muller, shows us how he scratched the surface of this amazing software.
Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo XI continues to find new ways to make your computer a more capable image enhancing machine. It is a digital darkroom of the highest order and for under AUS$200 it is without doubt incredible value for money. Paint Shop Pro Photo XI retains the interface and features of its predecessor, but contains new image enhancement automations that make producing works of art so much easier.
Its new Skin Smoothing function is an excellent tool for softening and perfecting skin textures.
The girls will love that one, as will any portrait or glamour photographer for that matter!
There is also a new Time Machine function that is quite useful, and can be used in conjunction with PSP Photo 11’s many other tools. The Time Machine simulates imaging
effects through the ages, starting with Daguerreotypes from 1839 right through to the cross processing techniques of the late 1960’s. With the click of a mouse you can replicate effects that would otherwise take much longer and would require a fair amount of digital imaging know how.
What we have done with our feature image is to combine these tools and show
how fully featured PSP Photo 11 is. However, we are only scratching the surface of this
software’s capabilities. To give this exercise a go, download the free trial version of the
software from www.corel.com.au and follow the prompts to the download.
Now that you have done that, open your image. If you want to use the image we have
used, you can download it from our website.
Go to www.total-image.com.au/corel and right click on the jpeg named “Antonio”. Select
‘Save Target As’ and direct the image to a directory you will remember. Its under one
megabyte so it won’t take long.
Now that you have the image, open it in Paint Shop Pro Photo XI. Then go to the Menu
for Effects>Photo Effects>Time Machine.
The Time machine palette will open and show you the options. For the first alteration, I chose Daguerreo type. I also ticked on Preview on Image so I could see a more accurate preview in the large image and not just the thumbnail in the palette. Move the slider to your desired effect and then click ‘ok’.
Now, you have a beautiful Daguerreotype image. Save this file under a new name. It’s
too lovely not to! But, for the sake of our article we will do a bit more. Go to Adjust>Brightness and Contrast>Curves and change the diagonal line in the Curves box to a nice “S” shape. This will increase the contrast. Save this new image
again under a new name.
Now, go to File>Recent Files and reopen the original file. Press ‘Control A’ simultaneously
to select the entire image, and then press ‘Control C’ to copy it. Close the image. Control
F4 will do that for you. Next, go to Edit>Paste as New Layer. You now have both your colour
original and the new image sitting one on top of the other. Its time to use Layers creatively
to blend the two.
If your Layers Palette is not already visible, go to View>Palettes>Layers. You will see the
Layers Palette appear on the right. Now, use the Opacity slider just above the top image
to the left and slide it to the left so that the percentage reduces. This now gives you a
mixture of the black and white image and the colour original. When the desired mix is found,
leave it there. For this image a blend of about 22 percent was used, with the colour image
on top and the black and white image as the background. Now you need to make two layers
into one. Go to Layers>Merge>Merge All (Flatten) and your two images become one.
Save this file under a new name.
Now, you can leave it there, or you can do some more if you like. You may wish to
sharpen the image to enhance its texture. Go to Adjust>Sharpness>Unsharp Mask and set
for desired effect. You will get a preview for each new setting. The default setting worked
well for this image.
For a final kick to the image, you may wish to revisit Curves, like we did, just to give the image one final kick in the butt. You could also go to Image>Picture Frame and select an appropriate edge, even as we did. But, with an editing suite like Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo XI, there are so many things you could do. Perhaps the difficulty
is in knowing when to stop.
Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo XI is a professional photo editing suite with almost unlimited
capacity. It rivals those that are several times its price and offers the photographer the ability to produce the images he imagines.
Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo XI is available and retails for around AUS$199. You can download a
trial version free from www.corel.com.au and follow the prompts.
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