Best free software ?

[LittleSkink]

done a search for this topic on forum without success, so apologies if I am restarting an old thread

being a bit tight fisted (well, to be fair I would rather spend my cash on kit than pay for software that some nice people are willing to give away free to show how clever they are ). Only been digital for 3 months with a K10, so this Raw/Edit workflow thing is all pretty new


What I use is below, but interested in knowing if there is better out there, or a REAL good reason why I should pay for something

Raw conversion:
Raw Therapy - seems to be brill, not found any batch processing option yet but mostly use it for single pics anyhow (and there is an option to apply last seetigns to new pic, so it is quite quick for me)

HRD:
FDR Tools Basic- still learning this stuff but the program does the business for me

Panorama:
Autostitch
Panotools

only played with these really, both work well in specific situations where the other might struggle - another key reason I went digital as I always fancied a Fuji 617 but didnt have the cash

Mosaic:
Andrea Mosiac - not managed to get enough pics together to try this yet

Editing:
GIMP seems popular but use Elements 2.0 as it came free with my scanner. As I generally try to get the pic right when its taken mostly use this for crops, unsharp and maybe a bit of cloning out nasties

Album:
need one of these soon, so any recommendations welcome here

cheers

[Clicker]

[quote=LittleSkink;326965]done a search for this topic on forum without success, so apologies if I am restarting an old thread

being a bit tight fisted (well, to be fair I would rather spend my cash on kit than pay for software that some nice people are willing to give away free to show how clever they are ). Only been digital for 3 months with a K10, so this Raw/Edit workflow thing is all pretty new


What I use is below, but interested in knowing if there is better out there, or a REAL good reason why I should pay for something

Raw conversion:
Raw Therapy - seems to be brill, not found any batch processing option yet but mostly use it for single pics anyhow (and there is an option to apply last seetigns to new pic, so it is quite quick for me)

Raw shooter essentials

HRD:
FDR Tools Basic- still learning this stuff but the program does the business for me

Panorama:
Autostitch
Panotools

Hugin

only played with these really, both work well in specific situations where the other might struggle - another key reason I went digital as I always fancied a Fuji 617 but didnt have the cash

Mosaic:
Andrea Mosiac - not managed to get enough pics together to try this yet
This is good.

Editing:
GIMP seems popular but use Elements 2.0 as it came free with my scanner. As I generally try to get the pic right when its taken mostly use this for crops, unsharp and maybe a bit of cloning out nasties

Album:
need one of these soon, so any recommendations welcome here

Jalbum or Multiply

My suggestions but i use not free unless you use torrents, PS3, Photomatix and LR.

[Mike Cash]

For freeware, I'm a GIMP and Irfanview guy.

Then a few months ago a person I thought was my friend gave me an invitation to the beta version of Lightroom 2. I ended up buying it and am unspeakably glad I did.

Autostitch will expire on you one of these days and you'll be looking at having to buy different software that includes it as a component. Cheapest one is around $35, I think.

[mithrandir]

In addition to GIMP and Irfanview, I would suggest Paint.Net

[RBellavance]

You can also use UFRaw to convert RAW images and import them into Gimp.

[JETninja]

Whats wrong with using the included Silky Pics program that came with the Camera for your RAW processing?

Don't get me wrong, I'm very new to this too. I also have some nice payware programs to use once I build a new PC. (CS3 Suite, etc) But I have a lot to learn......

[RBellavance]

Originally Posted by JETninja

Whats wrong with using the included Silky Pics program that came with the Camera for your RAW processing?

Speaking for myself, it does not run on Linux to begin with. But even so, having tried it on my wife's Macbook, I strongly dislike its interface and I find it slow to update the preview when making changes.

[Arpe]

Originally Posted by Mike Cash

Autostitch will expire on you one of these days and you'll be looking at having to buy different software that includes it as a component. Cheapest one is around $35, I think.

Then you just go and download the latest version and install.

[mingdie]

I used to do my raw conversions with Raw shooter but as soon as I tried Silkypix that was it. The colours is so much better in Silkypix. The interface may not be the best but for me the picture quality is more important.

[hwblanks]

Even though I have Lightroom, I still like Irfanview for quickie jobs. Irfanview also has a great batch processing feature which will let you rename files, as well as convert RAW to JPG.

Heather

[kerrowdown]

Get someone else to buy CS3 for you.

[SpecialK]

Whats wrong with using the included Silky Pics program that came with the Camera for your RAW processing?

I used the Pentax software for 18 months. It does have too way much white space in the interface - therefore less room for the preview space, and requires overlapping the control windows. The controls use sliders with no provision to enter a numeric value. There is no "healing brush" or "clone" feature, so you will need something else for dust-spotting, if nothing else.

It works, just with a 1980's feel to it :-)

The Photo Browser portion actually has 3 useful features. The "Extract a jpg" is much faster than the actual conversion process. I used that for a quick look in another viewer which I like much better. The "Save data list" of exif data is nice. And last but not least is that when copying file name from jpgs to PEfs or vice versa, clicking on the filename does not select the extension so you don't have to worry about over-writing that when you paste it.

I did upgrade from Pentax to Elements just a couple weeks ago, but that one you pay for :-)

Sorry to the OP I don't have an answer for you.

[wlank]

Originally Posted by SpecialK

I did upgrade from Pentax to Elements just a couple weeks ago, but that one you pay for :-)

Just ordered a refurbished Epson V500. Exactly the same as a new one, except the price - $149.00 at the Epson store with free shipping. Elements is included.