This is still a work in progress
I didn't make a mistake in the title of this article. The product really has been rebranded again, this time as PaintShop Photo Pro X3, with "Paint" and "Shop" really spelled as one word with a capital "S" in the middle, with "Photo" following "PaintShop", and and then "Pro" followed by the sexied-up version number. Marketing people have to look like they're earning their keep, right?
Probably the next most noticeable change in the PSPX3P interface is the modification to the Graphite color scheme introduced in PSPPX2. Personally, I hated the old Graphite look and possibly hate the new one even more, but you may not. The hard-to-read white-on-gray controls are gone, replaced with white-on-(almost)black. I had thought the gray workspace of PSPPX2 was really too dark for accurate color and brightness correction of photos, so you can guess what I think about the even darker version. You might have a different opinion, however, so give it a try. If you don't like it, you can turn it off by unchecking View | Use Graphite Workspace Theme.
In addition to the color scheme change, you'll also find changes to dialog boxes.
There are some bug fixes and cosmetic changes, and even a couple new features:
Local Tone Mapping Command: This is simply the old Clarify command with a new name. Folks who think Clarify was broken in PSPX will find that there's no improvement with Local Tone Mapping.
Resize Command:
Crop Tool:
Vibrancy:
Smart Carver:
In addition to these, there's now support for video. This is probably cannibalized from Ulead's PhotoImpact, Corel having acquired Ulead a while back. I haven't tried it out yet, though, so I can't tell you anything about it. I also haven't tried the new Organizer.
Express Lab (View | Express Lab) has been enhanced a bit. If you have a lot of snapshots you'd like to process quickly, you might want to check it out. Here you'll find some very commonly used photo editing tools and commands, including Straighten, Crop, Smart Photo Fix, Rotate, the Makeover tool, the Clone brush, and the Red Eye tool. Sharpening, which was missing in the PSPPX2 Express Lab, is now included.
You're joking right? Corel has no interest in adding or enhancing graphics features. The last graphics-related feature added was layer styles. (And compared to Photoshop layer styles, PSPP's are rather primitive.) There's nothin' new here, folks.
Well, that's not completely true. The Text tool has finally been changed so that text is added straight onto the image, without a text entry dialog. That's definitely a step in the right direction. The new Text tool isn't perfect, though, since the text box on which your text appears is totally opaque, obscuring the image beneath.
Yes, it's PSPPX2 redux — a whole lot of bugs.
Don't depend on Corel to list all of the bugs in their knowledge base, although you will find some pertinent info there. Instead, you might want to head out to the PSPPX2 newsgroup and see what problems users are reporting. (As of this writing, Corel has not set up a PSPX3P newsgroup.)
To subscribe to the newsgroup, go to http://www.corel.com/servlet/Satellite/us/en/Content/1152796556333 Then click "Start using the Corel Newsgroups", read the information and the rules, then scroll through the newsgroups listing and click "Paint Shop Pro Photo X2".
Vector Capital has recently bought back all shares of Corel stock. I'm guessing here, but given Corel's financial woes, it looks like maybe VC wants to be able to make some moves that won't involve being slowed down by stockholders. This may mean that they plan to sell off (semi-)successful divisions and kill off the other divisions. And, unfortunately, it's not clear that PSPP falls into the first category.
What I usually say is that the answer depends on what you need. And, as I've also said before, many old-time users are happy to stay with PSPPX — or even PSP9 or PSP8. (If the last version you tried was PSPPX1, which is probably the most problematic of any release of PSP/PSPP, you've probably moved on to a different image editor by now.)
What I'll say this time, though, is definitely do not upgrade sight unseen. Head over to and try out the evaluation version of PSPX3P. And even if there are some things that you like about it, maybe also try out the trial version of Adobe Photoshop Elements 8 before making your decision.
I never thought I'd ever say this, but you might be a lot happier with Elements. And that, coming from me, is a very sad comment on the state of PSPP.
Copyright ©2010
Lori J. Davis
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