On Wed, 29 Apr 1998, Greg Tracy wrote:

> Lessee, Pshop at $650 and PSP at $100?  Perhaps you get what you pay for.

Exactly!

PSP 5.0 is just as big a piece of junk as PSP 4.0 was.  Here are just a
few of the MANY things that keep PSP as a low-end program and PShop as the
standard:
  - You still can't select from outside the image canvas in PSP like you
    can in PhotoShop. One easy cropping technique in PShop is to open the
    window past the canvas and use the marquee to select from outside the
    image area (above and to the left) then select diagonally across the
    image to the other side (stopping where you need  the image to be
    cropped on the bottom right side) then crop.. then repeat the
    process in the other direction. This method ensures you don't lose any
    pixels on the second crop, because you start outside the canvas area.
    You just can't do that in PSP (to select starting at the edge of the
    canvas you basically have to zoom in to about 4:1, which causes other
    problems when trying to gauge where to crop the image
  - PSP's automatic window scrolling is iffy at best. Some tools will
    scroll the window for you if you move the cursor off the screen, others
    wont.. (try getting the window to scroll around while selecting with
    the point-point lasso and zoomed in at 4:1 for instance.)
  - Actions, Actions, Actions!  Need I say any more?  If I do need to say
    any more, then PSP is probably for you.
  - All in all, it looks like they bought a copy of PhotoShop and tried to
    copy all of it's features, adding only a few of their own to the mix.
  - Taking into effect that last reason... PSP's interface is a BAD rip-off
    of PhotoShop's.. the layers pallete, for instance takes up 1/4 the
    screen, and  can't be made any smaller without great inconvenience.

Here are a few things that PSP DOES have going for itself:
  - They FINALLY got the antialiasing right.  This was a sorely missed
    feature in version 4.0.
  - They FINALLY figured out that there might be a need to move a floating
    selection halfway off canvas at some point in time.  This, in my
    opinion was a FLUBUP while making version 4.0.  It should never have
    been excluded in the first place, and I give them no credit for
    including it in version 5.0.
  - Picture tubes are pretty neat, I look forward to seing what they do
    with them in version 6.0 or maybe even 5.+
  - PSP still has some of the best Indexed image color-control tools around..
    I always will love their color-replacer.. maybe someday I'll sit down
    and figure out how to do the same in PShop, but I'm sure it won't
    be anywhere near as intuitive.)

I would still never even think of using PSP for the bulk of my work.
In fact, I get so little use out of it, I just let it keep telling me that
I should register ("You are on day 392 of your 30 day trial period")

So here is my take on the whole thing, and what I do personally:

Use Paint Shop Pro for touch-ups on indexed images (removing stray
pixels, undithering solid backgrounds, correcting palette entries, etc.

Use Paint Shop Pro for picture tube effects (if you want them..)

Use PhotoShop for everything else.

My 2 cents.. well.. more like 4 cents

Pat

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