Wow! X7 Ultimate

[edwinn]

Hey all, I landed a great deal on the boxed version X7U and have it installed in the default folder with Perfectly Clear added. Didn't install Facial Filter yet though. It's the first PSP upgrade since X4 here, and X7 is all registered with confirmation emails received.


So that everything comes out ok and I can report that it's working GREAT.. will need a little hand holding.

* Assume from pop-ups that SP2 can be installed without installing SP1?

* Ok to install LocalHelp right away? That failed on my last version of PSP.

* Go ahead and install Exif_Update now? or do SP2? The Note for Exif_ install says to have SP1 installed first?


That's about if for now.. looking very good so far.

-Ed

[edwinn]

Kinda' jumped the gun and installed the Local Help files already.

Trying it out, pressing F1 still went to the Corel website for help. Reading in online Help about Help it says that LH is available when you're Offline, so disabling network via the LAN icon, X7 popped up IE, but Active X script was blocked. So went into IE, Advanced an allowed Active X to run on local machine HTML.

Works ok now, but would prefer Local Help all the time. Do you have LH installed?


What next? SP1? or go right to SP2? What about Exif_ update?

-Ed

[edwinn]

Sorry for multiple posts, but the X7 install and updates went smoothly!

I made System Restore Points in between updates, and started-up PSP then rebooted each time.

Decided to remove the Local Help files by doing a System Restore.
Here's a quick TABLE of updates:

Code: Select all

 Step     Desc       Size     Rel Date      Version
 ----     ----       ----     --------      -------
  1       X7U        CD                   17.0.0.199
  2       SP1      154 MB     1-7-15      17.1.0.72
  3       Exif_      8 MB     2-9-15       Hotfix
  4       SP2      160 MB     3-17-15     17.2.0.16

So it's good to go!

[trueblue]

Hi Edwin, good to hear you are liking X7.

Rather than check in the help, go to Corel website and download the updates directly. http://www.paintshoppro.com/en/support/updates/ Install SP1 then SP2. It does state you required SP1 before installing EXIF update. The fact that you bought a boxed version, it would not have the updates on the disc.

Let's know how you go?

[Forriner]

You could make a desktop shortcut or a browser bookmark to the 'offline help'.
In X4 it's "C:\Program Files (x86)\Corel\Corel PaintShop Pro X4\Languages\EN\Help\wwhelp\wwhimpl\js\html\wwhelp.htm" where C: is the program drive of course. Maybe they changed a bit by X7, but you get the point.
Navigate there with windows explorer and right-click and drag the wwhelp.htm to your desktop, making the shortcut there. It opens the default browser.
Once it's opened in the browser you can bookmark it to open it when the browser is open.

[edwinn]

You could make a desktop shortcut.. to the 'offline help'. In X4 it's "C:\Program Files (x86)\Corel\Corel PaintShop Pro X4\Languages\EN\Help\wwhelp\wwhimpl\js\html\wwhelp.htm" Navigate there with windows explorer, right-click and drag the wwhelp.htm to your desktop..

Yeah thanks, that's what I'll do!

[edwinn]

Hi Edwin, good to hear you are liking X7.

Let's know how you go?

Hi Maureen, seems I've hit a wall with X7. Spent 6 hrs with it this morning. The gap that appears between the workspace and background in EDIT mode is becoming a nuisance. The shadows around images, and the rendering of thumbnails in Organizer are a step backward IMHO. Today I tried out Perfectly Clear X7U plugin for the first time and was shocked how crude it was. { screen-caps available }

Was also looking forward to running Topaz plugins, but right off the bat, found the original image loaded into Topaz Clarify was displayed in different colors than in PSP X7 EDIT mode. It was `yellow´ in appearance or soft. So now I don't know what's real, and what isn't!

It's turned into a can of worms. Any suggestions?

-Ed

[JoeB]

Hi Maureen, seems I've hit a wall with X7. Spent 6 hrs with it this morning. The gap that appears between the workspace and background in EDIT mode is becoming a nuisance.

Have you tried toggling between tabbed and non-tabbed view when that "crack" appears? I have seen that crack appear but only today read that this toggling is supposed to fix it. I haven't had the problem appear yet today but have created a button to toggle tabbed/untabbed and placed it beside the Window item on the menu bar. Will report back later to let you know if it works when the problem appears again.

The shadows around images, and the rendering of thumbnails in Organizer are a step backward IMHO.

That is definitely an issue when the window is larger than the image and, IMHO, is a bug that should be addressed. But as I usually work with the window set to Fit to Image it isn't something that affects me often.

Today I tried out Perfectly Clear X7U plugin for the first time and was shocked how crude it was. { screen-caps available }

My experience with Perfectly Clear is that when I have an image that is already in reasonable good shape but perhaps a bit underexposed and/or looking somewhat soft (I prefer sharp, fairly high contrast images) then Perfectly Clear seems to do an excellent job and can be tweaked besides. It doesn't seem to be able to do much, however, if an image has actual color cast, and it's denoise function seems to be much too aggressive in softening the whole image. In these situations the tweaking ability doesn't really help much. Keep in mind also that Perfectly Clear is not actually part of PSPX7 but is a plugin.

Was also looking forward to running Topaz plugins, but right off the bat, found the original image loaded into Topaz Clarify was displayed in different colors than in PSP X7 EDIT mode. It was `yellow´ in appearance or soft. So now I don't know what's real, and what isn't!

I have Topaz plugins and when I activate it I do not see any color cast whatsoever and the image that appears in the Topaz window looks exactly the same as the one in my PSP X7 workspace. Is it possible that the Topaz plugin you're using is pre-set to something that is causing that color cast? When you open the image in Topaz, try hitting the Reset button on the plugin and see if that fixes the problem.

[edwinn]

The shadows around images, and the rendering of thumbnails in Organizer are a step backward IMHO.

That is definitely an issue when the window is larger than the image and, IMHO, is a bug that should be addressed. But as I usually work with the window set to Fit to Image it isn't something that affects me often.

I'll respond to a few of your very good comments one at a time.

Here's a baseline clip of X4 Thumbnails in Manage mode.




Same view (only a little bigger in scale) of X7 Thumbnails in Manage mode.

They are using smoothed fonts of some kind, and with shadows. This is blurry IMHO



Suppose the smaller fonts are to accommodate longer file names.


To be fair, they are both 16M lossless PNG clips.

I'm not trying to bash X7 and really wanted to move ahead with it.


-Ed

[JoeB]

As I stated, I do believe these shadow things are a bug. But I'm not terribly concerned about them in the thumbnails, whether in Manage or the Organizer because the thumbs are simply to assist in selecting an image for working. The real problem is having the shadows in Edit mode and, for me, it's rarely an issue because I work with the window fitting the image. But for others it would be a problem and should be fixed.

[edwinn]

Today I tried out Perfectly Clear X7U plugin for the first time and was shocked how crude it was. { screen-caps available }

My experience with Perfectly Clear is that when I have an image that is already in reasonable good shape but perhaps a bit underexposed and/or looking somewhat soft (I prefer sharp, fairly high contrast images) then Perfectly Clear seems to do an excellent job and can be tweaked besides. It doesn't seem to be able to do much, however, if an image has actual color cast, and it's denoise function seems to be much too aggressive in softening the whole image. In these situations the tweaking ability doesn't really help much. Keep in mind also that Perfectly Clear is not actually part of PSPX7 but is a plugin.

Was also looking forward to running Topaz plugins, but right off the bat, found the original image loaded into Topaz Clarify was displayed in different colors than in PSP X7 EDIT mode. It was `yellow´ in appearance or soft. So now I don't know what's real, and what isn't!

I have Topaz plugins and when I activate it I do not see any color cast whatsoever and the image that appears in the Topaz window looks exactly the same as the one in my PSP X7 workspace. Is it possible that the Topaz plugin you're using is pre-set to something that is causing that color cast? When you open the image in Topaz, try hitting the Reset button on the plugin and see if that fixes the problem.

Here are a few screens to help describe the issues.


British fighter in X7 Edit mode. (full scale 100%)

Background set to dark gray as a "shadow workaround" or mitigation. I `selected´ it and move it up & left to save space.

Arrows point to `cracks´ in workspace edge, and to shadow.


Same image exported to X7 Perfectly Clear plugin.

Notice missing nomenclature and NO WAY to tell what Zoom level. 100% ? 90% ? 120% ? So I got out a ruler. Lol



Same image exported to Topaz Clarity. It's softer and `yellow´ in appearance.

How can one judge what's enhanced? See.. no shadow around image!


No filter was applied by Topaz. I hit RESET and tried it 5 times.

These three JPGs were FULL SIZE but the board rejected them, so they were reduce to 895 pix wide and unsharp mask = 20 applied.


-Ed

[JoeB]

Sorry, just deleted what I had just posted. I'm not sure what I said is accurate and I'll have to test again tomorrow when I have time.

EDIT UPDATE: I didn't wait until tomorrow and retested. I had taken all three of your images and saved them.

I started with your image of the X7 unprocessed workspace and cropped the Jet image from it.
I opened that Jet image in Topaz Clarity v.1.0 with the same settings you show for your Topaz plugin (i.e., everything reset to Default).

The image I get in Topaz is exactly the same as the original in my X7 workspace, with no color shifts of any sort and no yellowish color cast. So I have no idea what is causing that for you, unless Topaz is using a different color space than the sRGB color space that I presume is being used by your PSP program. But it doesn't seem to be a PSP issue, so it's either a Topaz issue with you or something else to do with your system/graphic settings.

I'll try to check out your issue with Perfectly Clear tomorrow.

[edwinn]

unless Topaz is using a different color space than the sRGB color space that I presume is being used by your PSP program. But it doesn't seem to be a PSP issue, so it's either a Topaz issue with you or something else to do with your system/graphic settings.

Thanks for the reply. The image below was made yesterday while doing all the comparisons.

This is a screen-cap of X4 with another screen-cap of a British Hawk opened in Perfectly Clear with messed-up tools and no zoom factor displayed.




This is X4 displaying another screen-cap of X4 with a screen-cap of Perfectly Clear opened in Topaz Detail inside. Confusing?



It basically show how Topaz "warms" and color-shifts any image that it handles.


So it's happening in both X4 and in X7.

I've reverted to testing Topaz in X4 for the time being. I think X7 will be good because it has 64-bit code. My PC isn't the greatest and was bought to take on trips (XE small form-factor case) and for low power consumption, which means low heat dissipation. Plus the deal on X7U boxed was too good to pass up.

-Ed


Note: still editing this post so it makes good sense..

[hartpaul]

Would be interesting to see if it does similar from Photoshop and any other graphics program that can use the Topaz filters.

[JoeB]

Would be interesting to see if it does similar from Photoshop and any other graphics program that can use the Topaz filters.

Actually, as I mentioned, the Topaz Clarity filter doesn't do anything wrong with your images in my PSP, and nobody else has reported the issue. I seriously think it has to be a user specific problem.

Also, Perfectly Clear has all of the correct buttons/slection options on my system and descriptions with those options. And again, nobody else is reporting the issue you are finding. So once again, I have to suggest that it is something specific with your system and/or installation. With Perfectly Clear I would suggest that you uninstall the plugin and reinstall it to see if that fixes the issue. You could also contact Corel support directly, explain the problem, and perhaps they could provide you with another copy of Perfectly Clear to install in case your installation file is corrupt.

However, because you are having issues with both Perfectly Clear and with Topaz that nobody else is reporting, I have to repeat that it would seem to be specific to your system. Sorry I couldn't be of more help.