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Adobe’s PhotoDeluxe Home Edition
by Reviewed by Lloyd Mizer—lmizer@juno.com—NOCCC - November 23, 1999 at 21:06:07:
If you are a professional who digitally edits photographs, you are familiar with Adobe’s PhotoShop. It is the industry leader for professional digital editing software, but most of us don’t need all of that power. Adobe’s PhotoDeluxe is the answer for us; it is an inexpensive image-editing program that will allow you to turn out high quality photographs. I recommend PhotoDeluxe for the non-professional who wants or needs to edit digital photographs. It is the leading editor for non-professionals, and it will allow you to do professional quality photographic editing at home. It provides a safe, friendly introduction to digital photo editing.PhotoDeluxe comes in a Home Edition and a Business Edition. This review will only cover the Home Edition. There is a Home Edition for the IBM Computer and another for the Macintosh. The PhotoDeluxe Home Edition was a Finalist for the 1999 Codie Award, in the category of “Best New Home Creativity Software Program.”
The interface is attractive and easy to use. The advanced menus give you access to all the functions in the step by step tools. It is easy to find and organize your photos. You can create personalized photo albums to share with family and friends in print, by e-mail, or on the Web.
Editing a photograph is not an easy task, but with PhotoDeluxe, it is possible even for a novice. The wizard tools will walk you through the common image manipulation and creative functions that will improve the quality of your photographs. It gives you the tools to remove “red-eye,” also for cropping, rotating, and resizing images. There are paintbrushes, erasers, controls for color adjustment, for contrast and hue. You can crop out distracting clutter, or use filters to sharpen or soften images and to provide special effects. After you learn the image editing basics, a right mouse click provides access to more tools.
After you have edited your image, you can combine it with PhotoDeluxe’s clip art to make a card, poster, custom calendars, or other artwork. It is easy to create a multimedia slide show, a PhotoParade that includes captions, titles, and a soundtrack.
The two main tool areas in PhotoDeluxe are Guided Activities and On Your Own. You can go from one area to the other with the click of a button. The Guided Activities are a small tutorial of a basic task. The Guided Activity provides access only to the tools needed for the task. The On Your On section provides flexible access to a wider range of features.
You can import from many image formats including, Seattle FilmWorks Pictures on Disk and Kodak Picture Disks to Snappy-like video-frame capture devices, inexpensive color scanners (such as Storm’s), and digital cameras.
It supports the basic Web file formats, such as GIF and JPEG, so you can get photographic reprints of your work, it is easy to send your images to online photo services. Adobe provides access to http://ActiveShare.com, a free web resource that allows you to post your photos, postcards, and puzzles directly from PhotoDeluxe.
Your family would love to have those irreplaceable family photographs restored and available to download. Your friends and family can go to your secure personal community location and view your photos. It is the fastest and least expensive way to distribute photos to friends and family. Your family does not need PhotoDeluxe to enjoy the fun.
The minimum requirements for the IBM version of PhotoDeluxe 3.0 Home Edition are, a Pentium II processor, at 233 MHz or a 100% compatible processor. Windows 95/98, with 32Mb of RAM, and 140Mb hard disk space. A Color Monitor with at least 1,000 colors [16-bit color ed.], a CD-ROM or DVD-Reader. You will also need a 32 bit Twain data source or Adobe PrintShop compatible plug-in, when using a scanner. PhotoDeluxe will work with Windows NT, but you will need 64Mb of RAM. Internet sharing features require Internet access (not included)
The minimum requirements for the Power Mac version is 12Mb of RAM, a 256 color monitor, a CD-ROM drive, 45Mb of disk space, and the System 7.0 operating system.
The PhotoDeluxe 3.0 Home Edition contains a CD-ROM with PhotoDeluxe Home software, 800 templates, 50 Adobe type library type fonts, Callisto Photo, MultiMedia Photo Album & viewer, and photo on line.
Adobe Systems Inc. Mountain View, CA 800-628-2320 415-961-4400. Street Price of IBM version $49.95.
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