Photoimpact 12 available for download from UK site

[deviney]

Yeah, the dirty SOB's announced this 2 days after I bought PI11. I have sent them an E-mail (which I expect will be ignored) and will call them Monday.

I am not happy about having a piece of software that is obsolete even before I get it in the mail. If they are unsympathetic, I will just refuse delivery and dispute the CC charge.

Anyways, below is what they list as the differences.
Sorry for the bad formatting but I am too tired to do anything but a C/P.

That happened to me last year! Except it was the very next day it got released. Almost did it again this year, but remembered new releases aways came out this month!

[Xyzzy2]

Shortest opinion on new features after reviewing what's new PDF: disappointing- in number and quality.

I was more positive about v11 after release.

Most changes geared toward people who really does not need software such as PhotoImpact in the first place (and I see a STRONG trend here; hopefully to be reversed in the coming years, as entry level software is separated from intermediate/prosumer). Also, automated tools offered by PI have never given me satisfying results.

I could use changes listed in Advanced Photo Tools topic, and a bit from Graphics tools. DVD menu designer (when released) can appear really useful to many.

I hoped for some kind of implementation of adjustment layers. Maybe next time.

Not upgrading right now, maybe, maybe later, more out of curiosity than actual need (and when discount is offered). So, to the v.13- I hope

Oh, and let me be a bit malicious here. We get like 5th or so tool for setting overall image hue. Isn't it a bit of overkill, Ulead?

X.

[Thorarinn]

The only products mentioned for the DVD Menu Maker Plug-in are MovieFactory 5 and VideoStudio 10. Does this signal the fate of DVD Workshop?

[sjj1805]

[wolverine]

The free trial is now available. I'm going to download it and check it out.

Like many I don't need the auto-do-it-for me and find 90% of the time it screws things up more than fixes. The only thing that will pursuade me to upgrade is large brush sizes and the ability to edit IPTC info. If those two things exist then it is auto-upgrade for me. Hopefully the memory overhead is less and it can handle larger file sizes, too.

We'll see. I'm downloading the trial now. My report later . . .

[wolverine]

Just did a quick review of P12. Here is what I've found:

Everything is pretty much the same as far as keyboard shortcuts and commands go. It was awkward for a while when I made the switch from PI8 to 11.

The one good thing that I found right off the bat was better noise reduction routine. It is sweet! But that wasn't enough to make me buy and I was going skip this upgrade.

The added a calendar routine, that would have done it except the dopes who did the routine won't let you control the output. You can copy and paste a finished page into a new document, but the program only outputs in low resolution for an inkjet printer. If you want to make photo quality prints you can't. Ulead if you are reading this make a fix so that we can output high-quality. Not everyone who use this product is a beginner!

Load time is slower than I expected and they should put a switch to allow users to switch off the splash screen. At least the goofy looking guy and green eyed girl (though a hottie) are finally gone.

I did crash it coverting a 3173x2234 @72 dpi to 11993x8444 @ 300dpi The largest I could make a file was 11105x7819 and stilll work on it without the program crashing (26x37@300dpi). I ran the test on my 1.3Ghz laptop w/512 memory.

The interpolation algorithm seems improved. At this size above that I could work with the image was not bad at all.

I wish the would give levels a keyboard short cut! Or at least make user assignable short cuts.

What truely sucks is they didn't increase the size of the brush tool. We are still limited down to 500 pixel brush sizes.

Overall the program seems to perform much faster which puts me on the fence about upgrading. If the brush sizes were larger it would have been a no brainer, but I think for now I'll hold pat with P11.

I have one more test to run to see if RAW support has improved. More on that later.

[2log]

It is impossible for Ulead Tech Support or Customer Service not to reply to you. Make sure you sent the query to the correct channel. Do not send an email directly to "Support@ulead.com". You have to fill up the Tech Support or Customer Service form. Once you filled up and sent the form you should receive an automatic reply notifying you that Ulead has already received your query.

Check your spam folder or modify your email security settings to allow email from Ulead and Explorecommerce if you haven't received it yet, then send a new query.

[Xyzzy2]

The problem is, that some mail providers seem to block Ulead completely, so user settings have nothing to do anyway- mails are dropped before their body is transmitted to provider's mail server.

The only way out is to find a provider that doesn't use blacklists/blacklist providers bloacking Ulead's mail servers.

X.

[disector]

I certainly appreciate all the help from you fellas. It’s a shame Ulead does not provide the same level of attention to their 10+ year paying customers.

Anyway, my poor ole camel gave out this morning, his back irreparably broken I’m afraid.

I have filled out and sent that annoying “customer service” form four times now with no response (an additional three times it just sat there and spun so I have no idea if those were delivered or not). I even dug into the web page code and tried sending mail directly to the form delivery address.

Several days have gone by now and no responses from Ulead. When I woke up this morning it dawned on me “I should not to work this hard to do business with a company” and thus I have contacted my CC company who have reversed the charges on my order. Since I am unable to contact Ulead I suppose they will contact me when they see the charge reversal.

I will keep using my PI version 6 and have just ordered Photoshop CS this morning.

Again, thanks for your feedback guys.

[Reactor]

It's a shame Ulead aren't creating features for the higher end user. Photoshop has a lot of really nifty tools, but I find it annoying as all heck to use in comparison to PI. I've recommended PI to many a high-end user, despite it being targeted at the beginner. But, so far I've seen little reason to upgrade from XL, myself. I like many of the quick PI tools, but as was said above, the quick fix tools don't do a great job (Google Picasa does a better quick fix- what I would pay to have that functionality in PI...) and I'm now left scratching my head, wondering when Ulead are going to enhance the areas of the program which make PI such a strong contender against Photoshop.

Ulead- wake up guys! PI 12 is nice, and has some good workflow enhancements from XL... but I can live without those. Give me a tool or two that really are worth paying for!

[sj1805]

PhotoImpact Box Download
Full (U.S. Site) $89.99 $89.99 (Is that an error - both the same price!)
Full (U.K. Site) £49.99 £44.99
Upgrade (U.S. site) $49.99 $49.99 (Is that an error - both the same price!)
Upgrade (U.K. site) £29.99 £24.99

Adobe Photoshop CS
Full £569.88 Box/Download appear to be the same price.
Upgrade £146.88
Currency converter shows
Full $1076.73
Upgrade $277.51

Enough said?

[aafuss]

Haven't upgraded my PI yet-I still use version 10, which does the job for me (Babya aoftware interface element design).

[Reactor]

So Adobe's target market is people in business, and they overprice their software... so what? Picasa is free and can enhance images better than the upgrade price for the new image editing enhancements in PI12... so price doesn't always speak for capabilities.

Personally, I'd be happy to pay a little more for a more advanced version of PI, but that's just me.

[Xyzzy2]

Personally, I'd be happy to pay a little more for a more advanced version of PI, but that's just me.

Me too.

Most of the changes in PI12 (all these simple modes, auto-fixes and calendar/etc wizards) should actually go to PhotoExplorer.
They completely don't fit PI and look to be slapped on in response to marketing request.

Also disappointing for me are really, really, really minimal improvements in existing tools. All that's added fe. to text tool is resize by dragging bounding box? Oh, come on, this should be in detailed improvements list, not put as an 'Enhanced' feature.

After a few days of trial I uninstalled PI12. For me, it's definitely not worth to upgrade.

X.

[sj1805]

Instead of whinging have you posted this request in
PhotoImpact feature request thread

Ulead themselves set up that thread as a means for users to post requested enhancements. How many software Companies give its users that sort of opportunity to help tailor future improvements to their products?