X3

[lilbytes]

I recently purchased Paint Shop Photo Pro X3 (Merry Christmas to me ). The last version of PSP I had was 8.01 (I think) and that was years ago. Not only am I rusty in getting back into designing, I'm also having to learn my way around this new version. Quick question: Can I do everything with X3 that I could do with v.8, including importing or installing photoshop plugins, brushes, etc.? Or maybe my question should be what can't I do with this version that I could do with v.8?

[Tadjio]

Essentially X3 will do everything that PSP 8 does.
One thing you need to know is that some Commands have been 'hidden' as 'Unused'.
To find these you have to go to Menu View \ Customize and pick 'Unused Commands'.
You can then put (drag) any you want onto a menu or toolbar.

Happy Christmas and Happy New Year

[wds937]

Just my 2¢: In general, the newer versions, including X3, can do everything that PSP 8 could do plus a few new things. Some things are just done a little differently. As with PSP 8, many Photoshop plugins will work with X3, though not all.

My experience with Paint Shop Pro is fairly extensive; I have all versions from 8 through X3. However, I mostly do photographs, rather than designing. Therefore, I don't use nearly all of PSP's features, so maybe others can shed additional light on this subject.

[LeviFiction]

Also X3 can't import any newer brush files than 8 can. At least it can't import photoshop brushes later than Photoshop 7 in my experience.

So while you still can import them if they are newer brush files you need a different method. Abrviewer is a free software that lets you export the brush images from the newer file formats. You can open those and export the images to PSP brushes yourself.

[Cassel]

To import Photoshop brushes, the easiest way is to export them as PNG in ABRViewer, and then use Suz' script (http://suzsplace.com/8scripts/ss-PSPBrushfromPNG.htm) to convert them to pspbrushes. Both steps (the ABRViewer export and the script) can be run in batch mode so it can be very fast to export/import a bunch of brushes that way.

Cassel

[LeviFiction]

Haha, had I known about Suz's script I never would have made mine. Of course I do it slightly differently. I just have it export all of the currently opened images as brushes. But most of the code is similar. XD Then again...how could it not be? *shrug*