newbie manage and edit workspace trouble

[sidetracked]

I feel completely idiotic here, but I can't seem to navigate around intuitively in this program. I am coming from LIghtroom and Zoner photo studio, and several other editing programs, and in all of them, if you are in the edit pane or tab, and you click the manage tab, the photo you are editing is available for "managing" ie, naming, tagging, exif, etc.
In psp x5, which I just purchased, if I am editing a photo, and click the manage tab, it takes me to the first photo in that folder, not the photo I am working on. How do I get to the photo I am editing in the manage pane without having to then search for it in the manager? I must be missing something.
You might ask, how did I get to the photo to edit it if I did not come through the manager first? well, I use other programs first, and click on "open in external editor" and it I select psp x5, it immediately opens the editor pane.
What I am desperately asking: is there a way to open the photo you are editing in the manage pane without having to look for it in the folder, or alternatively, if coming from another program, is there a way to have it open the manager by default?
Hope this makes sense, and I appreciate any input, thanks!

[LeviFiction]

No need to feel like an idiot. You're making a reasonable assumption that a program trying to be as good for photographers and editors as PSP is would follow a few basic standards for photo management.

I hate the manager personally. But there are some who absolutely enjoy it. As such anything I say from here on out should be taken more as my opinion than fact. But it's what I do know and have read. If anything I say here is wrong I will no doubt be corrected by one of the more knowledgeable users. It's one of the things I love about this place.

The answer to your questions though, is no.

No one ever accused Corel of making a manager that followed best practices. In fact for a while there switching back to Manager closed the image you were editing. So people who were doing big projects would lose or have to save their work before finding more images.

In the minds of Corel the workflow is Manage, minor Adjustments, and Full editing. There is little to no real inter-mingling. Though fortunately with X5 now when you switch back to Manage mode from Edit mode it maintains your original selection. It used to jump back to the beginning of the folder all of the time. That's about as close as we come to what you described.

When opening an image PSP will always assume you want to Edit it. PSP does have a default open state, Manage, Edit, or Keep Last View. But those are not taken into account when opening an image.

It is just not up to snuff with the more well established managers.

[sidetracked]

Levi-Fiction, Thank you(!) so much for your explanation, I understand now.
I guess I am willing to continue to use a combination of programs for photos, which is what I had hoping to get with psp, an all in one sort of thing.
I have been using Fast stone for viewing and organizing, picasa for tagging and I may have to go back to lightroom for editing, because I am starting to get very discouraged with psp after fooling with it for few hours, I find that more than half the time if I edit something and hit "save as" the program locks up, and I have to do a ctr-alt-delt to get anywhere.
My system meets the specs, and I am not running anything else, so don't know what the problem is.

[ADonahoo]

I find that more than half the time if I edit something and hit "save as" the program locks up, and I have to do a ctr-alt-delt to get anywhere.

I think I can help you with this. With my version of X5, when I save as or save copy as the dialog box for naming and navigating just doesn't appear. The program appears to be locked up because we are accustomed to seeing that dialog box immediately in every other program that we have ever used. Just click on the desktop or toggle to another open program and back and the save box will magically appear. I found this accidentally and have reported it as another bug.

[sidetracked]

No, actually, it was showing the save dialog box, and it was after I gave it a new name and hit save that it locked up...but thanks to your advice, I switched windows and then went back, and it worked...but then, the following day, it just stopped doing that, don't know why, but it has been behaving nicely since then, so I am getting along better with it.

Now I have couple of new questions about the edit workspace. First, I can't find a way to view the original and the edits together, so that I can see what I have done...a "before and after" view.
In lightroom, there is a dedicated "before and after" button, so that when you apply some adjustment, you can go back and see how it looked before without undoing the adjustment... In fastone there is a "hold down to view original button" but I can't find anything that lets me see what I have done...possibly I should make a copy with a different name to be deleted later so that I can flip back and forth? or is there a better way to see that?

Also, along the same lines...is there a way in PSP x5 to view two photos side by side to compare them for then choosing the best one?
Thanks in advance!

[LeviFiction]

There is no real before and after button in PSP.

There is a before and after preview for filters while inside the dialog. So when you select a filter from the Adjust or Effects menus the dialog that pops up will have an area for viewing the changes both before and after. You can also hide those before and after views and toggle the live preview on and off if you don't like the small windows.

To simulate original vs edit should actually answer your second question as well.

Go the menu bar, under Window deselect the "Tabbbed Documents" option. This will place the images into the old fashioned MDI windowed look. You can then view as many images on the screen as can fit in your workspace.

For a good before and after view you can use the "Duplicate" option (Also found in the Window menu, or just use the shortcut Shift + D). What this does is it creates a brand new image, never been saved, that contains all of the same image and layer data as the image you're currently working on. You can then apply all of your edits to the new image and see the original side by side.

now, admittedly it's not as good as an actual Before and After option but it works for the most part.

[Forriner]

X4 user here so I'm not sure about X5, as Corel breaks nice things as often as they fix them. Using the before and after in dialogue boxes, if you left-click and hold the button down in the after pane it will display the before view, much like Fastone. You can stretch the whole palette to make larger before and after panes, and you can zoom in, so it might just do the trick for you.
And of course there's always the Undo and Redo. And/or open the history palette (F3?)and play with that.

[hartpaul]

If I need to compare a before and after a number of changes I start off with Duplicate image and do the work on the duplicate and when I need to see a full size after image side by side with the adjusted image I just drag the original thumbnail from the bottom of the layers palette out onto the workspace where it is copied as Image 1 , image 2 etc as often as you do this trick. I can delete it to make more room and so long as I keep that original at the bottom of the layers palette I can bring out a copy to compare as easy as a click and drag.

[sidetracked]

Go the menu bar, under Window deselect the "Tabbbed Documents" option. This will place the images into the old fashioned MDI windowed look. You can then view as many images on the screen as can fit in your workspace..

Great! thanks that helps a lot, and I like the way they can be re-sized independently to look closer at certain areas.

[sidetracked]

X4 user here so I'm not sure about X5, as Corel breaks nice things as often as they fix them. Using the before and after in dialogue boxes, if you left-click and hold the button down in the after pane it will display the before view, much like Fastone. You can stretch the whole palette to make larger before and after panes, and you can zoom in, so it might just do the trick for you.
And of course there's always the Undo and Redo. And/or open the history palette (F3?)and play with that.

Thanks! I see, if I close the before and after preview, to take up less space, I can toggle the "preview on image" check mark, and that give a before and after view in a larger view.

[sidetracked]

If I need to compare a before and after a number of changes I start off with Duplicate image and do the work on the duplicate and when I need to see a full size after image side by side with the adjusted image I just drag the original thumbnail from the bottom of the layers palette out onto the workspace where it is copied as Image 1 , image 2 etc as often as you do this trick. I can delete it to make more room and so long as I keep that original at the bottom of the layers palette I can bring out a copy to compare as easy as a click and drag.

Good tip, I will have to try this way of working, too. Funny how when you start working in a new software, it is not so much how to use the tools (corel has good built in tool tips and guides, but most eveyone's tools are just about the same) but rather how best to efficiently navigate around in the workspace that can leave you soft of flailing around..I sure appreciate everyone's help.