Digi-Doodling and a Quick PhotoDirector 10 Ultra Review

 

I'm going to be photographing some big family events next year so (for the first time in nearly eight years) I'm investing in some new photography equipment - including my recent purchase of some new photo editing software. I've been digitally doodling with the new software ever since, the image above is my first attempt at a photo collage using images from my older photography work.

I really wanted one software that I could use to organise and edit lots of different images so after having a good look around I went for a program called PhotoDirector 10 Ultra which is by a company called CyberLink. I opted to buy a copy instead of subscribing, call me old fashioned but I like to own software instead of paying for it again and again, but the option to subscribe is there if that's what you're in to. When you buy through the website you get both Windows and Mac versions - I'm using the Windows version but it's handy to have the Mac option just in case I decide to go back Mac in the future.

 I've had a bit of a go and here are my initial thoughts on the software and it's different parts. 

Organising Images

PD10U has a Library section which reminds me of Lightroom and in my opinion is better than the Photos app you get on Mac- it's handy for keeping everything in one place and you can flag and rate images for easy retrieval later on.  Importing is easy and you can set where your project lives on the hard drive. This software has the option of tethered shooting but this isn't supported on my good old Olympus E420 so I'll be testing that feature when I get my hands on a new camera
(If any of you'd like to send me a new DSLR to review I'd be very happy to ;-) )


Image Adjustments and Editing 

 So far my experience of image manipulation with this software has been across two sections called 'Adjustment' and 'Edit' - between them I have found that I can do everything that I have thought to do to an image.

For main adjustments, naturally, it is under the 'Adjustment' section. In here I find myself frequently using Levels, Curves, Lens Correction, Shadows/Highlights and white balance correction but it's got a lot more than that.

I have found that sometimes you have to explore a little and know what you're looking for when you want to adjust only part of an image. For example I haven't found 'dodge' and 'burn' tools but when you think of the traditional darkroom dodge and burn are just under and over exposing parts of an image which in PD10U can be achieved by using the adjustment brush to paint a 'mask' over the part of the image that you want to edit and then adjust the exposure slider to either dodge or burn.

 You can add multiple masks to the same image to make a range of changes to different parts of your image.

Once you've adjusted your image you can use the 'Edit' section to get really creative.

In here you will find tools to adjust body shape (I don't know why you'd want to..) add photo effects - much like you would on your smartphone, remove things from an image, tools to extract parts of an image and an option to put images together.

So far my favourites have been Background Removal and Photo Composer - those are the two that I used to extract the image of the Magpie and put it on to the image of the tower.

I have found the tools easy to use and (if you need them) there are step by step instructions to help you achieve what you want to do.

The edit section is really precise and if you take your time you get great results - that magpie took me two hours to cut out!

When you're ready to export your image you have a choice of three file types: TIFF, JPG and PNG.

The Other Sections

There are three other sections of PhotoDirector 10: Layers, Create and Print - I've had a quick look at them but haven't yet used them.

I'm yet to work out what I'm going to do on the Layers section.

 I like the idea of being able to create slideshows from within PD10U and creating Gifs could be fun but quite honestly I don't know when I will get around to doing this in practice.

The print interface looks good with a wide variety of options but we'll see if it works as good as it looks when I install the printer.

The Verdict

I really like this software, it just works for me and (as far as I can tell) it does everything that I used to do on Adobe Photoshop with the added bonus of having organisation features - since purchasing it has definitely kept me up late on school nights!

I bought this whilst it was on special offer but even at it's full price of £79.99 it's value for money - remember I opted for the one off price to own my own copy. As a comparison I've looked at Adobe's current prices and you're looking at £119.21 for an annual subscription to use their Lightroom and Photoshop software - don't get me wrong their software is good but if you're like me you like to own your software and why would you pay more if you don't have to?

Have you used this software? What are your thoughts/views on it? What should I try next? Let me know.