Digital Photography Software

Valuable resource for any photographer

Digital Photography Software section is an invaluable resource for any photographer interested in the available choices of image-editing solutions, FTP transfer softwares, reverse image searching and much more...

Image Correction and Management Software Options

As digital photography has grown in sophistication, the choice of digital photography software applications targeted at the specific needs of the digital photographers has increased immensely too. All these options are making it a bit overwhelming and to help clarify your choices, we will summarize the different types of digital imaging applications and how they are used in a photo workflow. These applications can broadly be divided into four main categories:

Irrelevant of which digital photography software application you end up using, it is important to understand the underlying concepts behind the separate applications which in turn will help you become more flexible and adaptable in your workflow.

Digital Photography Software: File Browsers

The concept behind a file browsing software is to allow you to view the contents of a single folder very quickly. They are particularly useful when you perform your initial edit or for managing a small image library. Their limitation is that they can only view the contents of one folder at a time which does not make them suitable in managing a large image library as well as the images can be viewed only when the storage media is connected. The most popular file browser applications are Adobe Bridge and Photo Mechanic.

Adobe Bridge

Adobe Bridge is included with Adobe Photoshop CS and later and has evolved into a central file management application for all of the applications in the Adobe Creative Suite. Within Adobe Bridge, you can sort, keyword, and edit your photos, or preview a folder of project files including page layouts, Flash animations, HTML documents, and video clips. This versatility is advantageous for working across applications, but it can become cumbersome for photographers who need only the ability to download, edit, and organize photos quickly.

Photo Mechanic

Photo Mechanic, created by Camera Bits, performs downloading, renaming, backing up, rating, grouping, optimizing, maintaining, thinning, and exporting files.

Photo Mechanic's power lies in its flexibility. Custom sorting methods are available for your particular workflow. Multithreaded software works in the background to keep ahead of you, so images appear blazingly fast. You can view your originals full screen, compare similar shots side by side, delete the bad shots, tag photos while watching a slide show, and sort your keepers into multiple folders making it the preferred tool for the professionals in the photojournalism, newspaper and stock photography fields. While not as versatile as Adobe Bridge, Photo Mechanic is the tool of choice when speed is an absolute necessity.

Other file browser solutions are Google Picasa and ACDSee Pro Photo Manager 3 . The ACDSee Pro Photo Manager 3 is offered by ACD Systems which is recognized the world over as the leader in image management and technical illustration software. The software allows you to view, manage, edit and publish photos as well as enjoy organized files, perfected photos and more time behind the camera.

Digital Photography Software: Cataloging Solutions

At first glance File Browsers and Cataloging Softwares seem to perform very similar functions - display multiple files, sort according to multiple criteria and hand files off to other programs. However, there is a very important difference between the two. A cataloging softwares help you create a permanent database of your photo library including information such as metadata, thumbnails and more, while at the same time allowing you to view all your photos in one location, even if they reside in different folders or hard drives.

The searching capabilities within asset management applications are superior to those found in file browsers and allows for much more flexibility. For example, a quick keyword search for “family” might bring up photos from your family summer holiday in 2008, plus a Thanksgiving photos from last year, plus a host of individual photos from your family trips this year. Cataloging software is essential for managing a medium to large image library, because it helps you catalog, search, and find photos very quickly.

Cataloging software also allows you to work with offline images, such as images stored at a different location, or photos that are on disks that are currently not connected to your computer. This capability allows you to copy your catalog to your laptop and take it with you when traveling in order to work on it or show it to other people. Two of the most popular cataloging software applications are Microsoft Expression Media and Extensis Portfolio.

Microsoft Expression Media

Expression Media (formally known as iView MediaPro) is a longtime favorite of photographers for managing medium-sized image libraries and sharing photo catalogs with multiple users in a network environment. Expression Media has perhaps the shortest learning curve of the cataloging softwares.

Extensis Portfolio

Extensis Portfolio is quite a robust cataloging solution and is best suited for smaller stock or advertising agencies needing to store and access files on a network. The single-user version of Extensis Portfolio contains most of the key features found in the server based package at a much lower cost, making it an excellent choice for photographers who need to catalog 50,000 to 100,000 photos.

Digital Photography Software: Raw Processing Softwares

The purpose of a raw processing software is to convert your original raw files into more versatile file formats such as JPEGs and TIFFs through a decoding process called demosaicing. Before you commit to buying a raw processing software, it is important to make sure that it can read the raw file formats generated by your camera.

Adobe Camera Raw

Adobe Care Raw is included in Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom applications and is by far the most popular raw processing software at present. It provides a high degree of control over the color, contrast, and tone in your photos while its integration with Photoshop and Lightroom makes for an effective, efficient workflow. Adobe Camera Raw can be used with both Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom. While the display of the interface’s controls differs slightly between the two programs, the underlying programming and functionality is identical, making it easy to transfer photos between Lightroom and Photoshop.

Capture One

Capture One from Phase One is an excellent program and provides a superb suite of tools enabling you to capture, organize, edit, share and print images in a fast, flexible and efficient workflow. Some photographers prefer the look they get from Capture One over other raw processing applications.

Digital Photography Software:
All-In-One Workflow Solutions

Two of the prime examples of all-in-one workflow applications and Above Photoshop Lightroom and Apple Aperture. These programs streamline the process of editing a shoot, selecting your favorite images for processing, performing tone and color corrections, printing, and managing your image archives. They focus on fulfilling the core needs of digital photographers, leaving the specific, selective corrections to.

Apple Aperture

Aperture(available for Mac OS X only) is Apple’s all-in-one workflow solution that offers a compelling set of tools for editing, optimizing, and sharing photos. It excels in its flexibility in editing and selecting photos with a Light Table interface that is reminiscent of editing slides on a traditional light table, but improved for the digital age. Aperture also provides excellent built-in image backup features and a wide variety of different output options, from calendars to linen-bound books and slideshows to sophisticated web galleries.

Adobe Photoshop Lightroom

Lightroom is designed for digital photographers who need to process a whole shoot of images very quickly. Perhaps the best way to think of Lightroom is as a “hybrid application.” Adobe took the very best features found in file browsers and cataloging softwares, combined them with Adobe Camera Raw for image processing, and added printing and web gallery creation to round out the tool set. While you still need to jump into Photoshop to perform intensive compositing or image adjustments, Lightroom makes this an infrequent occurrence instead of the norm.

Digital Photography Software: Reverse Image Searching

If you think one of our images might have been used online without your permission, then give TinEye a try. It is a reverse image search engine allowing you to submit images and find out how they are being used and if modified versions of the images exist.

TinEye is the first image search engine on the web to use image identification technology rather than keywords, metadata or watermarks.

Digital Photography Software: FTP Client software

Filezilla - www.filezilla-project.org
Mac/Windows/Linux

FTP applications can be costly, but not with Filezilla . Multiple images and documents can be dragged and dropped for moving around from server to server or editing. It supports resume and transfer of files larger than 4 GB. Although free, support is available through wiki and forums on the site.

Fetch - http://fetchsoftworks.com
Mac

Fetch is a reliable, full-featured file transfer client for the Apple Macintosh whose user interface emphasizes simplicity and ease of use. Fetch supports FTP and SFTP, the most popular file transfer protocols on the Internet for compatibility with thousands of Internet service providers, web hosting companies, publishers, pre-press companies, and more. Download Fetch 5.5

Panic_Transmit_Icon

Transmit - http://www.panic.com/transmit/
Mac

Transmit is Panic's popular FTP client. It is popular with light-users and power-users alike due to its reliability and quick transfers. Transmit's interface and usability is clean, easy to understand and works without fail, time after time.

Digital Photography Software: Compression Software

Blubox

Blubox is a quick and easy-to-use digital photography software application for compressing and sharing digital photos and other files. Its main advantage is that it offers the ability to hugely compress image files without sacrificing overall picture quality.

Blubox is similar to zip but uses powerful image compression algorithms to compress over 60 popular image formats. It offers professionals the ability to send large amounts of image files via email at hugely increased speed. For a wedding photographer, for example this could mean uploading an entire album's-worth of images to a printer in a fraction of the time it takes now.

Unlike most Zip tools BluBox also includes a fully featured Preview and Slideshow feature, so that saves you having to extract your images to view them. Note that currently there is no Vista 64 bit support so do not buy it if you are running this version of the OS.

YemuZip - http://www.yellowmug.com/yemuzip/
Mac

YemuZip is an easy-to-use digital photography software application for making zip files. Just drag, drop, name your zip file and you are done.

The Finder's Archive function makes zip files that contains Mac-specific information that, when extracted on a PC, looks like garbage. YemuZip lets you choose between a PC-compatible format and a Mac format that preserve all the Mac-specific metadata.

Digital Photography Software: Telephone Services Software

Skype - the whole world can talk for free
Windows/Mac/Linux/Windows Mobille

You can make free audio and video calls from your computer to other users anywhere in the world. For a small fee calls can be made to landlines and mobile phones. You can also send SMS messages and hold conference calls and conference instant messaging chats.