Corel Paint Shop Pro

I’m very ambivalent about Corel’s Paint Shop Pro® (“PSP”— $100, $60 for an upgrade; Windows only). I happily used four versions of it over nearly seven years to prepare the pictures on this Web site. I found that it offered plenty of image editing power in a well-designed package at a reasonable price. In September 2005 Corel released Paint Shop Pro 10 (called “X” even though it’s not available for Apple’s Macintosh OS X). It added color management, support for color spaces beyond sRGB, and 16-bit-per-channel editing to its impressive list of features. Their absence had been a long-standing weakness that limited PSP’s usefulness for the professional or serious “prosumer” photographer who wants the best and most consistent color for prints. So I eagerly bought the upgrade. I only gradually discovered that those new features were unfinished, with undocumented deficiencies and limitations that made them unusable for me.

Corel seemed to have released Paint Shop Pro X as “beta” software, ready for public testing but not yet a finished product ready for sale. When I wrote to Corel’s technical support staff, they promptly acknowledged the problems. But they could provide no information about when, or even if, they planned to correct them. So with some reluctance I decided to buy Adobe’s “industry-standard” Photoshop® CS2 (which I subsequently upgraded to CS3). I don’t plan a review of Photoshop, since one of its advantages is the truly staggering amount of readily-available information about its every aspect.

Corel released Paint Shop Pro Photo XI in September 2006. It looked like a disappointingly insignificant upgrade intended to serve Corel’s marketing needs more than it benefited users. Perhaps its most impressive accomplishment was that it beat Adobe’s Elements 5.0 to market by about a month. And it added the word Photo to its name, presumably to better define it as a photo editing product. Some of XI’s new features might be useful, including improved Curves and Levels tools, limited editing of video clips, and a new “image organizer” that replaces PSP X’s widely-disparaged “browser.” Other features looked like gimmicks the marketeers dreamed up to give an unimpressive upgrade some buzz: a “skin smoother,” a “color changer,” filters that simulate different types of film, and a “time machine” that simulates the look of various antiquated photo technologies.

XI did not correct any of X’s deficiencies (which I’ll discuss at length). So what I say about PSP X also applies to XI. And following X’s precedent, XI introduced some significant new bugs, including broken PNG transparency and the inability to save 16-bit files in any format other than its native pspImage (which were fixed in the 116-megabyte “11.11” patch issued four months after the initial release). For the reasons I discuss, I have no plans to invest any more time or money in checking it out more thoroughly.

Right on schedule, Corel released PSP X2 in September 2007. Their strategy is perhaps becoming clear: Release a new version every September that adds enough gimmicks to give the marketeers something to tout, but nothing that really justifies buying an upgrade. X2 adds an “express” workflow for processing batches of images, a new “theme” for its user interface, some improvements to layers, and visible watermarks. It also continues the PSP tradition of “borrowing” features from Adobe Photoshop. This time it’s adjustable color filter settings for black and white conversion (inspired by the new black and white conversion tool in Photoshop CS3), and a tool to combine multiple exposures of a contrasty scene into a “High Dynamic Range” image (first introduced in Photoshop CS2). But I do have to acknowledge the sheer brilliance of the marketeer who dreamed up the only genuinely original feature in X2: Thinify™, a tool that’s supposed to make people look thinner!

Does X2 finally correct the deficiencies left over from PSP X? Probably not. In the scramble to get this year’s release out on schedule, Thinify™ most likely took priority over finishing the color management system. And based on past performance, the version of X2 on store shelves is almost certainly another unfinished “beta” release. The release notes document for X2 discloses 35 “known issues.” Nearly all of the 70 listed “product improvements” look suspiciously like fixes for bugs in XI (and none of them concern color management). In other words, if Thinify™ and a Graphite Workspace Theme that “really makes your photos stand out” aren’t sufficient reason to pay $60 for an (unfinished) upgrade, fixes for 70 bugs surely are— and as a bonus you get 35 new bugs, plus the opportunity to help Corel track down any others they didn’t have time to find themselves! The “12.01 update” released on 31 October 2007 is supposed to fix 20 bugs.

Strangely, no “professional” review of PSP X, XI or X2 I’ve seen in the paper or electronic press even mentions the shortcomings. Did any of the authors actually use the program? So I will discuss the deficiencies at some length, to help potential buyers and upgraders make an informed decision.

A Full Toolbox

How does PSP compare with Adobe’s Photoshop products? I’d say that PSP’s feature set puts it somewhere between the $99 Photoshop Elements and the $650 Photoshop CS3. Though similar in capability to Elements, it has some useful features Adobe omitted: notably scripting, tool presets, channel mixer, and a fully-functional Curves adjustment (Elements 5.0 finally included a lobotomized version of Curves). But it lacks the commercial printing, pervasive 16-bit color, and fully-realized color management capabilities of CS3.

Corel has tailored PSP for the user who is new to digital photography. They have tweaked the user interface to make it friendlier and easier. They also added a “Learning Center” that guides novices through common photo-editing tasks, along with one-click “Smart Photo Fix,” digital camera noise reduction, red-eye removal tools, and some support for video clips. The “Learning Center” can be turned off if you don’t need it. Those features seem to be fully finished and polished, so PSP could be a good choice for users who don’t immediately need (or understand) color management, color spaces, or 16-bit editing.

Since its debut in 1991, PSP has continuously “borrowed” a rich subset of Photoshop’s advanced features, including the myriad flavors of layers, palettes, tools, and filters. Almost everything a serious photographer needs is there, and it’s often easier to use than the Photoshop equivalent. (A good example is the Unsharp Mask tool, which in PSP X has a check box for luminance-only sharpening. That option ignores color information, so it allows a higher amount of sharpening without halos and artifacts and often yields more efficient JPEG compression. The Unsharp Mask tool in Photoshop CS3 lacks this option, so luminance-only sharpening is a convoluted effort. You can either convert an RGB image to LAB color before using Unsharp Mask on the Luminance channel, and then convert it back to RGB. Or else, after using Unsharp Mask, select “Fade Unsharp Mask” from the “Edit” menu, scroll down to the bottom of a large pull-down menu and select “Luminance,” and finally click “OK.”) I found that the learning curve for Photoshop CS2 was more about adjusting to a different approach, interface, and details than learning new or different ways to do common tasks. Much of it is amazingly familiar.

PSP includes a full set of classic Photoshop-inspired manual adjustment tools (Curves, Levels, Histogram, Channel Mixer, Hue/Saturation/Lightness; most of them are also available in adjustment layers) along with a suite of automated and semi-automated photo enhancement tools to easily adjust color balance, contrast, and saturation. The manual adjustments aren’t complete implementations of their Photoshop counterparts, but they’re close enough. You can save adjustment settings as “presets” to use later for similar images. The presets are perhaps the simplest example of a scripting facility that lets you record and name a sequence of operations that you can play back whenever you need it. Unless you’re a programmer, you don’t need to know that PSP stores the presets and recorded sequences as scripts in the Python programming language. If you are a programmer you can edit the scripts or create them from scratch.

There are also handy tools to straighten crooked horizons, correct common lens distortions, and remove scratches and red-eye. PSP X added a set of “Makeover Tools” for beautifying portraits and people pictures; and “Object Remover,” a very useful enhancement to the Clone Brush that replaces unwanted objects with a background you designate.

PSP has a noise-reduction tool for digital cameras that also works for film grain. I find it adequate, though inferior to the specialized NeatImage plug-in. But it may be preferable for “busy” images that lack the uniform areas NeatImage needs for its analysis, or for working with 16-bit images until Corel possibly implements 16-bit support for plug-ins. PSP X also adds High-Pass Sharpening, a new alternative to the venerable Unsharp Mask. The specialized FocalBlade sharpening plug-in is more powerful and convenient.

Raw Files, Unique Features, and Some Bells and Whistles

PSP X2 reads raw files from 85 different digital cameras as easily as it reads JPEG, TIFF, and dozens of other image file formats (PSP started life as a shareware program for converting image files between formats). This built-in raw conversion is convenient and probably adequate for many situations, but there are much better raw converters. The PSP X package included a copy of one of them, Pixmantec RawShooter Essentials. Since Adobe purchased Pixmantec and discontinued all RawShooter products, users of PSP XI and X2 will have to rely on the mediocre and infrequently-updated built-in converter, or use the raw converter the manufacturer provides with the camera. The released version of XI didn’t support Nikon’s D80, or Canon’s Rebel XTi/400D, 30D, and 5D. Users of those very popular DSLRs had to wait five months for the 116-megabyte “11.20” patch Corel issued in February 2007. X2 adds support for Nikon’s D40 and D40x, and the Olympus E-400. X2 doesn’t support Canon’s new 40D; the “12.01” update doesn’t add support for it.

One unique and valuable photo enhancement tool is “Clarify.” Ever since it first appeared in version 7, the PSP documentation has been rather taciturn about what “Clarify” actually does. It seems to redistribute brightness and contrast throughout an image to improve the subjective and intangible properties of “snap,” “clarity,” or “impact.” The effect is similar to the local contrast enhancement technique that uses Unsharp Masking with a large radius, but there’s more to it than that. With some images, it can almost miraculously improve shadow detail while toning down overly bright highlights. Other images turn garish and blotchy, with odd halos and hidden noise glaringly revealed; this is particularly a problem with outdoor scenes that include sky. You can often avoid these problems by selecting the sky in the picture and inverting the selection before trying “Clarify.” Although PSP X improved the flexibility and performance of this tool with a wider range of settings— and also introduced a troublesome bug— there’s no way to predict what you’ll get. “Clarify” is worth trying on every image after you’ve finished adjusting the color balance and histogram. The result will either delight or horrify. Corel describes “Clarify” as an alternative to other sharpening effects, but I find it’s still necessary to sharpen the final image. For Photoshop users, Pixel Vistas’ PhotoLift plug-in ($40 for Windows or Macintosh) provides an effect similar to “Clarify,” and with much greater control and flexibility. It works with Adobe Photoshop CS, CS2, CS3, and Elements 5.0. It’s not compatible with PSP.

PSP allows nearly limitless customization of the user interface “workspace” to organize all those tools the way that’s best for you. There are seven pre-loaded toolbars, but if you keep them all open you’ll clutter the screen needlessly. It’s better to use the “Customize” tool to add, delete, or move the commands you use most often in the standard toolbar and pull-down menus. For example, I have removed the icon to open a TWAIN scanner, but added an icon to reduce a 16-bit image to 8 bits. The standard toolbar includes an “Enhance Photo” button that contains a pull-down menu for putting photo-related tools in one convenient place. Unfortunately, if you’ve created customized workspaces in earlier versions of PSP, you’ll have to re-create them from scratch for PSP X because it uses a new and incompatible file format for saved workspaces.

For monochrome aficionados, there’s a black-and-white conversion tool that simulates the colored filters traditionally used to emphasize specific tones in the picture. It’s easier than doing the same thing with the Channel Mixer tool. A related tool simulates the look of infrared black and white film, turning green vegetation a ghostly glowing white and adding a specified amount of grain. Though it clearly belongs in the “bells and whistles” category, “Infrared Film” can be quite effective for certain pictures (and I’ve found that it works better than any infrared-simulating plug-in or Photoshop action I’ve seen). Licorice Moss at Point Vicente looked intriguing in the viewfinder, but I couldn’t make it work as a satisfying color picture. “Infrared Film” was just what it needed. With Emerald Bay in Infrared, it provided a fresh perspective on a much-photographed iconic location at Lake Tahoe.

The Complaint Department

The new 16-bit and color management features of PSP X looked compelling enough for me to buy the upgrade the day after Corel announced it. With any software, the impulsive “early adopter” inevitably risks volunteering for an unpaid job as a tester. PSP X demonstrated this risk more than most software. The implementation of those features was frustratingly incomplete and remains so in PSP XI and X2. Their documentation was even more deficient. Since Adobe announced version 4 of Photoshop Elements a mere two weeks after PSP X came out, I have to suspect that Corel obtained “intelligence” about Adobe’s plans and accelerated the release schedule to get it on the street before Adobe. Corel seems to have given priority to the “Learning Center” and other features aimed at novice users, so the implementation of advanced features may have been intentionally shortchanged in the deadline triage.

Most tools for adjusting color balance, density, and curves work with 16-bit images, as do most types of adjustment layers. But some essential tools do not, including the Clone Brush, Histogram Adjustment, Edge-Preserving Smooth, Salt and Pepper Filter, and Chromatic Aberration Removal (PSP XI and X2 only slightly expand the list of 16-bit tools). You need to convert the image to 8-bit color before you can use them; otherwise you’ll get a warning and an option to do the conversion with one button click. Adobe’s Elements has similar limitations, which may have given Corel’s management an excuse for failing to implement 16-bit color throughout PSP. You might be able to work around the limitations by using the tools that do support 16-bit color before reducing the image to 8 bits and using the other tools, even if that’s not the order you prefer. An article in Corel’s support knowledge base lists the commands and features that support 16-bit color.

Corel hasn’t implemented 16-bit color or color management for plug-ins in PSP X, XI, or X2. Plug-ins are “grayed out” on the Effects menu and unavailable when editing a 16-bit image. Plug-ins do work once you’ve reduced the image to 8 bits. More significantly, color management doesn’t work at all with plug-ins. I accidentally discovered this undocumented limitation when I noticed that the color and contrast of the window in iCorrect EditLab Pro looked different from what PSP showed. By trial and error, I discovered that if I changed the monitor profile to standard sRGB, the colors matched. PictoColor’s technical support told me that EditLab defaults to sRGB if the host application doesn’t provide color management information, and Corel’s technical support later confirmed that PSP X doesn’t provide it. That turned out to be the main showstopper for me because it makes EditLab all but useless. Duplicating EditLab’s functionality with native tools is unnecessarily cumbersome.

Respectful suggestion to Corel: If you can’t (or won’t) fully implement support for plug-ins, at least document the fact that plug-ins don’t work in 16-bit mode or with color management. Leaving customers to spend their time discovering this and other frustrating “secrets” for themselves is absolutely inexcusable, especially when Adobe so thoroughly dominates PSP’s market.

Another significant flaw in PSP’s color management is the lack of a command to convert images between color spaces. When you’re working in Adobe RGB (or another color space other than sRGB), you can’t easily convert an image to sRGB so it will look right in Web browsers, e-mail clients, and other software that doesn’t support color management. Saving files for Web or e-mail use is such a common scenario that Corel really needs to “borrow” some form of Photoshop’s “Convert Profile” command. But there is a kludgy workaround. Save the file as a TIFF or pspImage file with an embedded profile (along with JPEG, those are the only formats for which PSP supports embedded color profiles— another undocumented secret). Then close the file, reset the color profile in PSP to sRGB, re-open the file, and select the “Use embedded profile” radio button when the color profile mismatch warning appears. That makes PSP convert the Adobe RGB image into sRGB when it opens the file; any versions you subsequently save will be in the sRGB color space. Just be careful not to overwrite the original file, and remember to reset the color profile when you’re done.

To their credit, Corel’s technical support representatives quickly acknowledged the deficiencies when I asked about them. One of them even pointedly noted that “color space support is new to Paint Shop Pro X and we are still working to iron out any discrepancies.” But Corel doesn’t seem in any pressing hurry to finish the ironing. Color space support in PSP XI was still wrinkled, and the list of 70 “product improvements” in the release notes document for X2 includes nothing related to color spaces or plug-in support. You’ll want to periodically check Corel’s support Web site for update patches.

Why All the Secrecy?

A number of useful features added in PSP 8 and 9 are inexplicably hidden in the “Customize” tool under the strange heading of “Unused Commands.” Automatic Saturation Enhancement, Automatic Contrast Enhancement, Manual Color Correction, and several other tools from those versions are still available— but only if you’re privy to their undocumented “undisclosed location” and you specifically install them in your toolbars or menus. They don’t support 16-bit color, which suggests that Corel may eventually delete them. The new Smart Photo Fix (which integrates color balance and histogram adjustments) and Color Balance tools provide some of the functionality of those “unused commands,” and they do work in 16-bit mode. But they require more tweaking and don’t work as well.

The downloaded version of PSP doesn’t come with a printed manual. I didn’t think it came with a soft-copy manual either, until a private beta tester pointed out on Corel’s PSP X newsgroup that one is in fact buried in the “C:\Program Files\Corel\Corel Paint Shop Pro X” directory as PSP_User_Guide.pdf. There was no indication that it existed in the installation package, the release notes, or anywhere else. But I don’t think I would have missed much (beyond 6 megabytes of disk space) if I hadn’t found it. Compared with the informative 438-page manual that came with PSP 8, its meager 106 pages offer little more than a “getting started” guide for users new to both PSP and digital photography. It provides a cursory description of some features, but omits any discussion of the most powerful photography-oriented tools. XI’s “manual” is 111 pages, with the extra five pages presumably devoted to identifying a few new features.

The drastically cut-down manual means users have to rely on PSP’s shamefully incomplete help system. Information about many features is missing. There are numerous errors that can only be due to carelessness. And worst of all, the index is missing hundreds of topics, making the information unnecessarily difficult to find. Whether due to design, haste, or simple incompetence, too much about PSP X is undocumented and thus unusable. I find this situation not only deplorable but incomprehensible given Corel’s apparent focus on novice users. At least some of them will surely advance beyond the Learning Center’s hand-holding. If they don’t know about the features in the software they already have, they may well decide they need Adobe Photoshop rather than the next PSP upgrade.

Suzanne Shook and several other dedicated PSP users have compiled a Documentation Errata Web site that identifies and corrects a number of errors in the help system and provides the missing index entries. I have mixed feelings about it. They absolutely deserve kudos for providing an essential resource to the PSP community. But they are effectively rewarding Corel with a substantial donation of free labor. If Corel’s executives get the idea that they can now rely on volunteers to finish their half-baked products for free instead of paying for their employees to do the job right, I suspect there will soon be a mass resignation of volunteers. The help file for PSP XI looks better, perhaps because Corel availed themselves of the hard work that went into that Web site.

PSP users will find it useful to periodically browse Corel’s support knowledge base. Under the “Product and Services” pull-down, select “Paint Shop Pro” for the product and “Paint Shop Pro X” (XI or X2, as appropriate) for the sub-product. Then click the search button to see a list of all the entries pertaining to the version you chose. They seem to be adding and updating entries at a brisk pace, presumably in reaction to the volume of technical support queries from users who find the sparse documentation inadequate (or who simply don’t know where it’s hidden— one article is “Where can I find an electronic version of the user manual?”). The knowledge base is where Corel reveals the undocumented secrets of PSP— but only for those who know to look there. So now you’re in on the secret! And buried elsewhere on Corel’s Web site is a PDF-format Paint Shop Pro X Color Management Overview that reveals some of what they neglected to include in the program’s official documentation.

Paved With What Intentions?

Corel Corporation bought Jasc Software, the original developer of PSP, in October 2004. When I first heard about that, I updated this review to express my reservations about PSP’s future. Corel has a long history as a hospice or mortuary for a stunningly diverse collection of products acquired from troubled companies. WordPerfect, once the dominant word processor, is probably the best-known example. Corel acquired it from Novell, whose management got it from the bankrupt original developer and then all but destroyed it (and their company) in an inept scheme to challenge Microsoft. Thanks to its remaining loyal users, WordPerfect hangs on with a marginal share of the “office suite” market that Microsoft thoroughly dominates. Corel also had its own soap-opera history of brushes with bankruptcy, until a venture capital firm took it over in 2003 and apparently stabilized its financial condition.

The acquisition of Jasc and PSP coincided with the near-simultaneous release of PSP 9 and Adobe’s Photoshop Elements 3. The new Elements added (limited) 16-bit support, Photoshop’s renowned Adobe Camera Raw plug-in that reads raw files for a wide range of digital cameras, and a revamped user interface. PSP 9 was essentially a minor update to PSP 8, apparently rushed to premature release so Corel could announce something substantive with the merger. So I had every reason to expect that PSP would meet a fate similar to that of WordPerfect, especially considering that Corel was already selling several competing image-editing programs. I concluded my comments by noting that “what Corel actually does (with PSP 10?) to meet Adobe’s challenge should provide a good indication of their intentions.”

With the release of PSP X nearly a year later, Corel’s promotional materials made it look like they intended to actively promote and improve PSP, giving Adobe some serious competition. Now that I’ve seen the prematurely-released, poorly-documented, and ineptly-supported software, I’m not so sure. The venture capitalists may still be trying to figure out where they want PSP to fit in the market, and maybe even where it should fit within Corel’s own menagerie of graphics and imaging products (especially since they’ve recently bought Ulead and added its line of imaging and video software to the zoo). The blurbs on the retail packaging, the anorectic user manual, the “Learning Center,” and the added one-click fixes give rise to much speculation among veteran PSP users that Corel intends to dumb it down further for the novice snapshooter market and cede the “prosumer” market to Adobe. But the 16-bit and color management features, though unfinished, suggest they intend to attract the “prosumer” as well. Corel’s turbulent history makes any prognostication uncertain. But what I’ve seen so far makes me even more skeptical about PSP’s future, at least as useful software for “prosumer” or professional photographers.

With PSP X, Corel quietly killed Paint Shop Pro Studio, introduced with version 9 as a simpler and lower-priced photo editor and organizer for casual digital snapshooters. Corel filled that place in the product line with a new version of Corel Photo Album ($49; $29 to upgrade). Along with basic image editing functions, it provides tools for cataloging and archiving image files along with “creative projects” like scrapbooks and greeting cards. Those functions complement PSP’s, so Corel included a somewhat stripped-down version of Photo Album in the PSP X bundle. I haven’t installed Photo Album, so I can’t say anything about it.

With PSP XI, Corel introduced Snapfire ($40). Corel’s Web site unfortunately didn’t make the distinction between this and Photo Album very clear. Like Photo Album, Snapfire offered basic photo editing tools for family snapshots, an image organizer, and various templates for calendars, collages, and “creative” projects. Snapfire seemed more oriented toward multimedia and the Internet. It included photo sharing, e-mail, slide show, and video clip features, along with a tool to download image files from digital cameras. PSP XI included a stripped-down version of Snapfire rather than Photo Album. PSP X2 includes a download of MediaOne Plus, which wasn’t yet available when X2 shipped. It has apparently replaced Snapfire, which seems to have disappeared from the roster of products on Corel’s Web site.

PSP versions 5 through 9 included Animation Shop, a separate program for creating and editing animated GIF files. Beginning with PSP X, if you need those features you’ll have to buy Animation Shop separately for $20. That version is the same as the one that came with PSP 8 and 9, which means it apparently no longer integrates seamlessly with PSP.

Recommendations

If you make your living from digital graphic arts and work with commercial printing— or if you’re a Macintosh user, as PSP is available only for Windows— you’ll definitely need to spend the $650 for Photoshop, plus $200 or so every 18 months for upgrades. (By the way, that CD of Elements bundled with your camera, scanner, or printer might qualify you to buy Photoshop at half price under one of Adobe’s promotional offers. That’s what I did.)

If you don’t need (or can’t afford) Photoshop but you still want powerful photo-editing software, I really would suggest looking for a used or remaindered copy of PSP 8 or 9 rather than buying the unfinished PSP X, XI, or X2. Those versions provide more features than even the current version of Photoshop Elements, and they include complete and usable documentation. They lack support for 16-bit color or color spaces other than sRGB, but they do take advantage of the limited color management capabilities that Windows provides. It’s also worth looking for one of these versions if you’re now using PSP 6 or earlier, since they added so many useful features. If you do need color management, Photoshop Elements is probably a better choice because it includes a stripped-down but fully functional version of Photoshop’s color management system. It also includes Adobe’s excellent Adobe Camera Raw converter, although with a simplified user interface.

I enjoyed using PSP for nearly seven years, and I really do like many of the improvements Corel made in X. I wish I could continue using it as my main image editor, as in many ways it’s more pleasant to use than Photoshop. If Corel’s executives ever decide to finish the color management features, I think PSP just might be the Photoshop alternative that gives Adobe’s executives insomnia. That is, unless the venture capital experts decide to position PSP as an entry-level product, strip it of advanced features that compete with their other imaging products, and leave the “prosumer” market to Adobe. They might come up with a coherent strategy some day, or at least a better one than releasing a new unfinished version each year. Or maybe not. The only thing I can say with certainty is that Corel has lost me as a customer.

Pixmantec RawShooter Essentials

Pixmantec was a Danish company that developed and sold RawShooter, an innovative viewer and converter for digital camera raw files. RawShooter Essentials was the free version, powerful enough for professional use. RawShooter Premium was the paid version that added a number of useful features.

Adobe bought Pixmantec at the end of June 2006. They made a public relations blunder when they abruptly “vaporized” RawShooter Premium, greatly angering its loyal and vociferous users. After several weeks, Adobe announced that Premium owners would receive a free copy of Lightroom 1.0 when that was released. The marketeers seem to have done a brilliant if belated job of converting the Pixmantec customers they carelessly snubbed into eager gamma testers for the first Lightroom release.

Adobe promised a final update of RawShooter Essentials that specifically added support for Canon’s 30D DSLR. This would remain available for download until the official release of Lightroom. Essentials and Premium will continue to work indefinitely, although the lack of support for any future cameras will render them useless sooner rather than later. Both RawShooter versions support DNG, but an incomplete implementation means they won’t work with any new cameras even if you convert their raw files to DNG.

Adobe took down the Pixmantec Web site and the Essentials download at the end of February 2007. But Essentials remains available on various download sites. Type RawShooter Essentials 2006 download in a search engine to find them. It’s still a good choice at a great price (free) if your camera was on the market at the beginning of 2006 or earlier. But it does not support an increasing number of popular cameras, including Canon’s 5D, 40D, and 400D/Digital Rebel XTi; and Nikon’s D40, D40x D80, D3, and D300.

Raw Shooter Essentials requires on-line registration with a Pixmantec server that no longer exists. Each time you start an unregistered copy, it will display a nag screen while it attempts to contact the registration server. I know of no way to remove it. Although some of Pixmantec’s innovations were assimilated into version 4 of Adobe Camera Raw for Lightroom and Photoshop CS3, Adobe clearly intends for the “legacy” Pixmantec products to fade quietly into oblivion.