Can you recommend a good Photo Printing software?

babelfish

Ive got quite an old Adobe Photoshop Elements 2.0 and would really like a good photo editing software. I can't afford anything too expensive but Id like my photos to look clear and professional and not as though they've been printed out on my pc.

Ive got a good printer and find that if I just print my pictures direct from my camera, via the pc, they're excellent quality but if I use adobe to make adjustments such as lightening or altering the colour the print quality isn't very good at all, so I think the problem lies with Adobe rather than with my pc or printer.

InsideInsurance

GIMP has always been the main alternative to Photoshop on a budget and its free of charge. I havent used it for a few years but the user interface didnt used to be as intuitive to use as Photoshop is thus had a steep learning curve but was just as powerful once you learnt it.

It may have improved with more recent releases and there did used to be a separate skin you could download and add to it which brought it much closer to Photoshop in terms of its look and feel.

When you are using Photoshop Elements, what file format are you saving it as with what settings? Are you printing directly from PE? If you save the image as a JPG with a high quality setting and print from the computer outside of PE do you have the same issues?

Fightsback

babelfish wrote: »

Ive got quite an old Adobe Photoshop Elements 2.0 and would really like a good photo editing software. I can't afford anything too expensive but Id like my photos to look clear and professional and not as though they've been printed out on my pc.

Ive got a good printer and find that if I just print my pictures direct from my camera, via the pc, they're excellent quality but if I use adobe to make adjustments such as lightening or altering the colour the print quality isn't very good at all, so I think the problem lies with Adobe rather than with my pc or printer.

Are you adjusting colours and lighting etc ?

If so you need to think of how your monitor matches to true photo characteristics, there is something called ICC colour profiles and you may need it for your monitor. Professional photographers spend fortunes on decent monitors that match true photo colour profiles.

https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop-elements/using/setting-color-management.html

wongataa

The issues could be down to your printer. Cheaper ones aren't as good at printing photos. It could be down to your editing. You could have the wrong printer settings.

When editing you really need a fully colour managed workflow to make sure the colours on screen are accurate and are printed correctly. if you don't have this all bets are off on where the actual problem is.

Fightsback

wongataa wrote: »

The issues could be down to your printer. Cheaper ones aren't as good at printing photos. It could be down to your editing. You could have the wrong printer settings.

When editing you really need a fully colour managed workflow to make sure the colours on screen are accurate and are printed correctly. if you don't have this all bets are off on where the actual problem is.

As the OP states:

Ive got a good printer and find that if I just print my pictures direct from my camera, via the pc, they're excellent quality but if I use adobe

Nothing wrong with the printer, it will be most likely the colour profiling in photoshop.

wongataa

Fightsback wrote: »

As the OP states:



Nothing wrong with the printer, it will be most likely the colour profiling in photoshop.

We don't actually know. We only have the OP's word. They may think it's a good printer for photo printing when in fact it isn't or it may be a perfectly suitable printer.

I agree that the issues are most likely incorrect setup of the printing process and colour settings.

Fightsback

wongataa wrote: »

We don't actually know. We only have the OP's word. They may think it's a good printer for photo printing when in fact it isn't or it may be a perfectly suitable printer.

So the OP is a liar or an imbecile ?

:wall:

Farway

Fightsback wrote: »

So the OP is a liar or an imbecile ?

:wall:

Neither, either or both, take your pick

The discussion is about photography, not state of mind of OP, so why bring it up except as cheap point scoring?

Fightsback

Farway wrote: »

Neither, either or both, take your pick

The discussion is about photography, not state of mind of OP, so why bring it up except as cheap point scoring?

It's quite a valid point as the OP has probably seen a few photos in their time and is more than capable of determining what constitutes a good image. It was an exceedingly patronising (and erroneous) comment with respect to the OP and deserved a Hitchslap. The OP doesn't need to think their printer is rubbish and rush out and buy a new one, it will be photoshop color space printing settings.

excellent quality

Le_Kirk

I use Photoshop Elements 9 & 12 to edit/adjust my pictures but whenever I have used Elements for printing, the quality (colour) has been poor. I therefore do as advised earlier, adjust in PE, save as a maximum quality .jpg and then use the print interface from Windows Explorer (XP & Windows7) to open up my printer interface. Of course it is important to tell your printer what you want and equally as important to use the correct paper (i.e. matched to the printer) of the highest quality. I use Epson (for my Epson printer) Ultra Glossy. Within the printer settings tell it what paper you are using and set for Best Photo (or whatever quality settings your printer interface uses.

Fightsback

Good article here on PE colour settings:

http://graphicssoft.about.com/od/aboutgraphics/f/printedcolors.htm