Get a FREE fully-working copy of Steganos Security Suite 7 (worth £49.99) when you sign up to the Practical PC Newsletter. Review: StudioLine Photo 2.6
A lot of software for not a lot
| Product | StudioLine Photo 2.6 |
|---|---|
| Company | StudioLine |
| Web | www.studioline.net |
| Price | £35 boxed/£32 download |
| We like | Archiving, web page generation, protection of original images, RAW support |
| We don't like | Unusual interface, inflexible in places |
| Rating | 9/10 |
| Requirements |
StudioLine Photo 2 from H&M Software could well be just what the doctor ordered for budding digital photographers. Within the one program it offers image archiving, editing and presentation tools each with a range of options and features.
It does have a somewhat unusual interface which is initially odd but you soon get used to it. Whilst I found the alternative Windows interface added little to the program and possibly detracted from it, one feature was interesting. There is almost nowhere where you'll find OK/Cancel buttons. Whatever you select just happens. After a while I found myself wondering why all programs don't start going down this route. I also felt that it wasn't always designed with normal users in mind. For instance when entering information you are sometimes asked to enter an argument which is programmer-speak for an option.
Safety First
Unlike many similar products, StudioLine Photo 2 goes out of its way to preserve the original photos. To begin with, you are required to import your photos from their current location in to the program's database. You have various options with the default being to copy the images, leaving your originals safe. Of course you could delete them afterwards if disk space is at a premium. The second feature which I was particularly impressed with was that all editing and filtering is made non-destructively. The original image is preserved with the changes recorded as a series of processing steps. If you ever decide you don't like the way a photo has ended up, you can delete one or more of the processes you have used. You can even re-order them to create different effects.
When you do start to get low on space, the program allows you to archive images to CD or DVD. Again, everything is preserved with the images and edits being recorded to the CD/DVD. You can then opt to remove the images from your hard disk once you know they are safely recorded elsewhere.
The database also lets you to add descriptions to the images allowing you to sort them in various ways as well as employ complex searches.
Processing
Once your images are loaded in to the database, you can start to process them. This can be done individually or in batches. All the usual suspects are present including red-eye removal, blurring, sharpening and colour balancing. This is one area where StudioLine Photo 2 falls behind such programs as PhotoShop Elements 2 though. You can only apply changes to the whole image and the range of filters and processing is limited compared to some programs. That said, what is here will be enough for the vast majority of users. Furthermore, you can easily copy filter settings from one image to another.
Sharing your Images
Once you have your images catalogued and processed, you can start to think about sharing them with your friends and family. While the program offers a basic slide show option, one of its strengths is in the area of automatic generation of web pages. Simply choose a selection of photos and a template and the program will generate all the web pages for you complete with suitably scaled thumbnails. The range of templates isn't vast but those that are there are very attractive and feature nice rollover effects.
You can email pictures using a variety of modem friendly options to minimise the size of the files being sent. The printing options are also reasonably thorough offering different sizes and layouts. You can mix and match different image sizes and StudioLine Photo 2 will fit them as best as it can on to each page.
Update
We first looked at StudioLine Photo 2 in early 2004. Since then it has had several updates and is now at version 2.6. Existing users of version 2.x can upgrade to the latest version for free. So, what's new?
The red-eye tool has been improved to also cope with 'pet-eye' i.e. the various glowing eye effects you get when photographing animal's eyes. A great new feature is that filtering and image tools now work on a split screen which shows the before and after effects within a single image. You can also control where the split occurs.
A huge step forward for many users will be the support for various RAW formats. As each of these is unique to a particular camera model, the developers have had to keep updating these to keep the program up to date with new models. RAW format allows you far finer control over the look of an image and bypasses the camera's internal processing to give you far more latitude with a shot.
Version 2.5 introduced a new look interface but we'd still like to see a more standard looking one. The newer one does provide more space for you images though with various toolboxes now being tucked away. More importantly, dual monitor support has been added allowing you to keep all your toolboxes on one screen and just the images on the other. great idea that makes it far more usable.
You can now view photos on a timeline. This allows you to select a date or period and see the photos that were taken during the selected date(s). We did find this could be a little slow unless you have a fast hard drive though.
The latest version, 2.6 has primarily added the ability to design your own layouts for greetings cards, calendars and so on. Previously you were limited to the built in templates. It also adds some speed improvements but we still felt it needs a bit more optimising, especially with higher resolution shots from the latest generation of digital cameras.
As well as the improvements mentioned, almost every area has been tweaked and numerous minor improvements made to the range of tools, filters and effects. The developers certainly keep busy. Even as we were working on this review we noticed the latest download on the web site has moved on to 2.7.
Conclusion
Whilst there are better programs for image processing, if you want a way to organize and archive your images whilst tidying up and enhancing them then StudioLine Photo 2 is well worth checking out. It's a little sluggish in places although it does do a lot of background processing to allow you to continue working whilst it gets on with other things. It also features a wealth of hand holding in the form of tutorials, a printed manual and lots of on screen hints and tips. The latter can be switched off individually once you've got to know your way around each area. The updates come thick and fast and the web site includes a useful forum for asking questions directly or sharing information with other users. For the money this is an awful lot of program and should prove useful for anyone with an interest in digital photography.
