Making the Rails with Photo Director 2011

By PF Staff in Influential Photo Gear on Jan 9, 2013

Cyberlink's Photo Director 2011 is a photo cataloging and editing software program much like Adobe’s Lightroom, but it is more user friendly, easier to learn and less costly. Like Lightroom, Photo Director 2011 includes a Library mode where photographers can access all of their photos, rate the best pictures from a shoot and add keywords for a rapid search. Photos can also be exported and shared online at Flickr and Facebook.

In the Adjustment mode, Photo Director offers a complete set of editing tools for white balance, tone, levels, and sharpening, and also includes numerous presets that can quickly change, improve and add to a photo's impact. As a bonus, the online website offers many more preset freebies. In short, Photo Director is a superb tool for photographers. I find it helps with my work flow immensely.

Post Processing

To make "The Rails" using Photo Director 2011, I first imported my photo into the program and then cropped it.

I then switched on the "before and after" previews., a very useful feature because it& instantly shows the results of each edit or adjustment. Then, in the adjustments menu, I changed the white balance settings which gave my photo a much brighter look. Next, I changed the tone with the auto tone wand. Again, using the dual preview made it very easy to make the correct adjustments. Satisfied with how these simple changes improved my photo, I then sampled the presets to see if I could further improve "The Rails" . The small browser located underneath the preset menus reflects the changes as you mouse over each preset before it is actually applied. I chose the "Dusk IV" setting which gave my photo its unique look. Satisfied, I saved the image as a jpeg.

Conclusion

Having tried both Lightroom 3 and Photo Director 2011, I have found many similarities. Both tools greatly enhance the digital photography process. However, Photo Director 2011 is easier to use. It offers many of the same features as Lightroom, is less expensive, and greatly adds to the photographer's digital darkroom.

Here is the original photo: