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October Meeting Review

MGI's PhotoSuite III and Video Wave II

By Wally David

 

MGI PhotoSuite III Box.WORKING WITH GRAPHIC IMAGES and video on the PC is a vexing problem for many people. While the tools available now are wonderfully powerful, they also require a steep learning curve and a big budget. And for many--businesspeople and home users--that can be a major problem. Graphics professionals use Adobe PhotoShop and Adobe Premier, the industry standards for photo editing and digital video editing, respectively. But what about the rest of us, whose needs are less demanding? Look no further. MGI Software has two products that will be of great interest to the non-professional graphics and video editor.

Randy Whittle of MGI came to the October General Meeting of the Danbury Area Computer Society to present PhotoSuite III and Video Wave II. Randy was a very personable presenter. He had a good sense of humor and a smooth speaking style. He did, however, have trouble with the interface of PhotoSuite III. According to Randy, the interface is dramatically different from the previous version. Considering he only received the new version a few days before the DACS meeting, he really did an admirable job.

After answering some preliminary digital photography questions, Randy got down to the business of showing us PhotoSuite III. What struck everyone at the meeting was how simple and clean the new interface is. The software leads you through each task, from cloning to cropping to applying special effects, with step-by-step, on-screen instruction at the left side of the window. In fact, PhotoSuite III is laid out like the ever-popular Web browser, complete with Back and Home buttons along the top of the window.

PhotoSuite III Screen Shot.While Randy gave an admirable run-through, I was glad to have a copy of PhotoSuite III to test out for myself. While I have used Adobe PhotoShop for a number of years, it usually takes me a long time to accomplish simple tasks, since I don't spend much time with the program. I thought I'd be a fair test subject, since I am at least familiar with PhotoShop.

PhotoSuite III lets you bring pictures into the application in a number of ways. You can control your scanner or digital camera with PhotoSuite III, as well as pull them in from your hard drive and from the Kodak PHOTNET Online service if you are a member. Upon opening a photograph, a series of buttons pop up on the left side of the window. You can choose to rotate and crop, apply special effects, paint and draw, stitch photos together, and create a photo tapestry.

Three areas really caught my eye. The first was TouchUp. Choices in the TouchUp area let you remove the dreaded red-eye, remove scratches, wrinkles, and blemishes from a scanned photograph, and apply TouchUp filters. I chose a scanned photo of one of our family's puppies to see how quickly I could improve it. The dog has a black coat. In the photo, bits of dust that had been on the scanner bed when I scanned the photo showed up as small white flecks on her coat. I was able to remove these using the Remove Blemish tool. Using an on-screen slider, I simply adjusted the size of the brush to cover the small areas that I wanted to correct. Then I clicked on the flecks and they blended away. Then I used the Clone tool to remove a bright leaf from the surface of a wooden deck in a matter of seconds.

For the final touch, I pressed the Enhance button. This analyzes the image and applies whatever adjustments PhotoSuite III feels are in order. In this case, it punched up the color of the decking and slightly sharpened the overall image. All this took a matter of moments. I can't begin to tell you how long this would have taken with PhotoShop.

Something that Randy showed us that really drew audience approval was Auto Stitching. PhotoSuite III's Auto Stitching feature lets you create your own panoramic images. It seamlessly and automatically stitches up to five images. He showed us four pictures of a lighthouse. They were taken so that there was a bit of overlap between them. He then stepped through the on-screen instructions, and within a few minutes he had a panoramic photo of a lighthouse. It was incredibly easy to do. I was able to recreate the same thing at home, since the photos he used were included on the CD.

There are many other features and effects that deserve mention, like the scores of templates that encompass a wide range of projects and the subtle color wash effects that put Ted Turner's colonization to shame. However, because of space constraints, I can't go cover all of them. I can tell you, however, that I don't see myself launching PhotoShop anytime soon. I don't really see the need. For more information on PhotoSuite III, you can visit the Website at www.photosuite.com.

Randy also gave us a brief run-through of Video Wave II. Like PhotoSuite III, Video Wave II sports a very user-friendly interface. Randy assembled a short feature on an ice-dancing couple. He combined videoclips, sound, and effects to achieve a professional looking video in a very short time. Look for a complete review of Video Wave II in Mike Kaltchnee's story later in this issue of dacs.doc. If you want even more info on Video Wave II, check out www.videowave.com.

MGI is well known for creating software that lets business and home users achieve professional- looking results without spending lots of time and money in the process. PhotoSuite III and Video Wave II live up to that reputation, and then some.




Wally David, DACS Chairman, is a Deskside Support Engineer for GE Capitol IT Solutions. He also has a computer consulting business and can be reached via his Website at www.dcenet.com or via e-mail at wallydavid@myself.com.

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