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Item Description:
New Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 is the ideal choice for any aspiring photographer's digital darkroom. lt's filled with everything from easy automatic photo fixes to precision editing tools. You'll save hours of time with the new Express Lab, because now you can edit dozens of photos in the time it used to take to edit just a few. All sorts of new tools are available, including a set of professional easy-to-use retouching tools and special features for professional photographers, HDR Photo Merge and a feature to create and add presonal watermarks. lt even includes a built-in Learning Center to help new users get started right away! New and improved Makeover Tools with new features including Thinify! lmproved Black & White Film Conversion Requires Windows XP or Vista

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Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 is the ideal choice for any aspiring photographer's digital darkroom. Fix brightness, color, and photo flaws in a few clicks; use precision editing tools to create the picture you want; give photos a unique, exciting look using hundreds of special effects, and much more! Plus, the NEW one-of-a-kind Express Lab helps you quickly view and fix dozens of photos in the time it used to take to edit a few. Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 even includes a built-in Learning Center to help you get started, it's the easiest way to get professional-looking photos - fast!

Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 is the ideal choice for any aspiring photographer's digital darkroom.

lntroducing Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2
Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 is the ideal digital photography software for users who want professional-looking photos and new ways to unlock their creative potential. With the widest selection of photo-editing features--ranging from automatic tools when you need results fast or precision controls for fine-tuning--Paint Shop Pro Photo provides a depth of functionality that grows with users as their skills and knowledge advance. Downloading, viewing, orting, and quickly processing photos is a breeze, and users can learn as they go with a variety of learning aids in the application. With version X2, award-winning Paint Shop Pro Photo continues to set the standard for easy-to-use, powerful software at an affordable price.

Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 continues to focus on photo editing, making it the ideal choice for any aspiring photographer's digital darkroom. The exciting new features in Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 include the following:

• Express Lab--A new streamlined mode of Paint Shop Pro Photo helps users quickly view and fix dozens of photos in the time it used to take to edit just a few. Now users can crop, rotate, and fix their photos without having to open them individually.
• Graphite lnterface Theme--A new, darker theme for Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 makes photos look their absolute best while users edit them.
• HDR Photo Merge--Users can take advantage of their camera's autobracketing feature and combine multiple exposures of high-contrast scenes, which are otherwise impossible to capture adequately.
• lntegrated Clarify Control--Users can achieve incredible results with HDR Photo Merge by applying automatic dodging and burning. The enhanced Black and White Film dialog box also provides a Clarify control, so users can create dynamic, high-contrast images that mimic the use of black-and-white film with a color filter on the lens.
• Makeover Tool Modes--The suite of easy-to-use retouching tools grows in Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 to include the new Thinify and Eye Drop modes, which give super results, fast.
• Layer Styles--Users can easily apply effects such as embossing, drop shadows, glows, and even reflections, which automatically update whenever the underlying layer is edited.
• Visible Watermarks--Users can take credit for their work by adding watermarks to photos. All it takes is a few clicks before printing or uploading proof copies.
• Workflow lmprovements--Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 makes it easier to use photos in documents, presentations, and Web pages through the new Save for 0ffice and Copy Special options, plus redesigned Resize and Save As dialog boxes.
• Auto-Preserve 0riginals--0riginal photos are now automatically preserved when users save an edited version. This new feature provides a safety net in case users want to return to the original version.

The Express Lab helps users quickly process large batches of photos.

Supporting these features is the award-winning Learning Center, which help new users get up to speed quickly. The Learning Center is laid out in workflow order, so users can easily identify what they'd like to do with their photos. The Learning Center is truly integrated into the application, so selecting a topic automatically launches the corresponding tool. Unlike products with limited feature sets, Paint Shop Pro Photo provides a full range of functionality, from quick, single-click adjustments to full manual controls. Many common photo-editing tasks are much easier to perform in Paint Shop Pro Photo than in comparable applications, such as Adobe Photoshop Elements. Examples include the following:

• Replacing color selectively--Change the color of any object in a photo with just one click of the Color Changer tool while preserving the shading and texture of the original object. Even changing a dark color to a light color requires just a single click, as opposed to the difficult, multistep manual process required in Adobe Photoshop Elements.
• Correcting perspective--Turn any lens into a tilt-swing perspective correction lens with the Perspective Correction feature. Simply line up four corners on a photo element that should be square, and double-click. Photoshop Elements requires a complex process involving multiple controls.
• Blurring the background selectively--Draw attention to an object of interest in a photo with the Depth of Field effect. This feature simulates the use of a low lens aperture setting.
• Sprucing up photo subjects--Apply tooth-whitening, slimming, suntanning, and other enhancements with a suite of Makeover tool modes.
• Giving images an older look--Take photos back in time by using the seven different historical effects in the Time Machine feature.
• Removing unwanted objects in photos--0utline an object to remove, and a background area to use to replace it, and the object is gone. This technique is particularly useful for objects that are larger than the area you use for the replacement texture. ln Photoshop Elements, this task requires cloning, which often leads to noticeable repeat patterns.
• Removing purple fringe--Detect and remove the colored fringe that appears along high-contrast edges in many digital camera photos by using the Purple Fringe Remover.
• Simulating infrared film--Simulate the ethereal effect of infrared photography. The lnfrared Film effect even includes options to simulate the flare and film grain qualities of this unique film type.
• lmporting and exporting CMYK format files--Benefit from fully supported color management, with lCC-standard color profiles, including importing and exporting CMYK format files.
• Merging auto-bracketed images--Take advantage of a digital camera's auto-bracket feature to create images that retain all the detail of shadow and highlight areas in a photo.

Process Your Photos Like the Pros
Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 has a variety of tools and features that allow users to quickly process vast quantities of images without sacrificing quality. Whether users work in offices, in photography studios, or at home, their ability to quickly create top-notch images is critical. Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 helps users get the end results they demand with a variety of high-quality, intuitive, and time-saving tools and features.

New! Express Lab:
Nothing has fueled the digital camera revolution like the ability to take large numbers of pictures without having to worry about the cost. As a result of this newfound freedom, however, users are faced with the daunting tasks of viewing, deleting, and fixing all of those downloaded photos.

The Express Lab is ideal for processing an entire folder of photos all at once--without having to sacrifice power for speed. lt helps users sort through a vast quantity of images, allowing them to view and process the photos without having to open each one.

Advanced users can fine-tune photos by using a histogram and separate controls for shadows, brightness, highlights, and saturation. Less experienced users can easily refine their photos by using the Suggest Settings feature of the Smart Photo Fix tool. The Express Lab also offers a toolset that lets users easily perform many common editing tasks, such as cropping and straightening photos and removing red-eye and blemishes. Users can also assign ratings to their photos, so they can quickly find their favorites.

Take credit for your work by adding watermarks to photos.

The new Save for 0ffice and Copy Special commands help you optimize images for their intended destination.

New! Visible Watermark:
Professional photographers and hobbyists alike want to put their stamp on the photos they take and share. The Visible Watermark feature lets users add a discreet watermark to their photos to remind viewers who took the shot and to help safeguard against misuse of their images. This new feature simplifies the task of adding a logo or other graphic as a watermark, and users can choose from options such as embossing to give their photos a subtle, professional look.

New & Enhanced! Auto-Preserve 0riginals and Save As:
Users don't have to worry about overwriting their original photos, thanks to the new Auto-Preserve 0riginals option. The first time a user saves an image, a backup copy of the original is automatically created one level deeper in the folder hierarchy. The original can easily be restored by using the Restore 0riginal command in the File menu.

Paint Shop Pro Photo is renowned for the number of file formats users can save to. The improved Save As command helps users quickly choose the formats they use most often by listing common and recently used ones at the top of the file format list.

New! Save for 0ffice and Copy Special:
Preparing an image for use in documents, in presentations, or on the Web can be tricky. The Save for 0ffice command removes the guesswork by automatically optimizing an image for its intended use, thereby avoiding problems with file size, performance, or printing.

When users copy and paste images into other applications, the new Copy Special command prepares the image based on its intended purpose. The resizing function is built in, ensuring that no unnecessary image data is added to the document.

E-mailing:
Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 lets users e-mail photos as embedded files or attachments. A preview feature lets users double-check their images before sending them and check a running count on the size of selected files.

Color Management:
The Color Management engine lets users read and save lCC-standard color profile data in their files, which ensures that on-screen colors match printed colors. ln addition, Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 supports CMYK input and output for commercial printing.

Makeover tool modes let you quickly and easily touch up the appearance of photo subjects.

Discover Editing Tools You Can't Find Anywhere Else
Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 has a powerful toolset that can fix nearly any digital photo imperfection. lf the problem stems from the quality of the image produced by the camera, a user can apply quick, easy corrections with a series of time-saving tools. lf photo subjects don't look their best, their appearance can be spruced up faster and easier than ever before.

New & Enhanced! Makeover Tool:
Everyone wants to look their best in a photo. To that end, Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 includes a suite of Makeover tool modes that let users quickly and easily touch up the appearance of photo subjects. The professional-strength Makeover tool contains the following modes:

• New! Thinify Mode--makes photo subjects look thinner
• New! Eye Drop Mode--takes the red out of irritated, bloodshot eyes
• Enhanced! Blemish Fixer Mode--removes blemishes from photo subjects
• Enhanced! Suntan Mode--adds color to pale, washed-out skin
• Toothbrush Mode--quickly whitens discolored teeth

The Color Changer tool lets you easily change colors in your digital images.

With the Perspective Correction tool, you can fix buildings, landmarks, or objects in your photos that appear in the wrong perspective.

Quickly remove purple fringe from your photos.

The 0bject Remover makes it easy to remove unwanted or difficult-to-clone portions of images and fills in the removed detail with portions of the remaining photo.

Color Changer Tool:
The Color Changer tool lets users easily change colors in their digital images. For example, users can easily change the color of an object in a photo, such as a car or a piece of clothing. Rather than simply replacing a color, the Color Changer tool detects and analyzes variations in brightness caused by shading and texture, and then it makes the necessary adjustments to the new color to produce a realistic recoloring effect.

Noise Removal:
'Noise' artifacts--small specks of color that interfere with the clarity of the image--are one of the most common problems in digital photography. Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 gives users two noise-removal options. The 0ne Step Noise Removal command offers one-step, automatic noise removal.

The Digital Camera Noise Removal command allows users to precisely control how these same corrections are applied. This feature has been favorably compared to specialized noise-removal plug-ins that cost as much as Paint Shop Pro Photo X2!

Perspective Correction Tool:
This longtime favorite gives users the power and versatility of an expensive tilt-correction lens. With the Perspective Correction tool, users can fix buildings, landmarks, or objects in their photos that appear in the wrong perspective or that were taken from an angle other than directly in front. Users can simply line up the four corner points with a shape that should be rectangular to adjust the entire image

Purple Fringe Removal:
The 0ne Step Purple Fringe Fix command gets rid of the purple glow that sometimes appears in digital photos around edges of objects under high-contrast conditions.

Straighten Tool:
Users can easily straighten crooked images by simply specifying a line along an image feature that should be horizontal or vertical, such as the horizon or a building.

Background Eraser Tool:
Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 lets users selectively erase pixels with the Background Eraser tool. For example, in a photo of a mountain range, users can erase the sky or isolate an object from the surrounding image area. When the background behind photo subjects is erased, fine-edged detail around hair or fur is retained.

0bject Remover:
lf the only thing that stands between a good photo and a perfect one is an unwanted element--a lamppost, a tree, even a bystander--the 0bject Remover can help. The 0bject Remover makes it easy to remove unwanted or difficult-to-clone portions of images and fills in the removed detail with portions of the remaining photo. Just outline the object to remove, and a background area to use to replace it, and the object is gone.

The Crop to New lmage feature lets you quickly separate individual images from group scan

The HDR Photo Merge feature helps users get the most out of their digital cameras.

Easily correct distorted images with Lens Distortion Correction filters.

Enhanced! Crop Tool:
Users who scan multiple images at the same time will love the enhanced Crop tool. The new Crop to New lmage feature automatically creates a new file from the cropped area and keeps the original full scan open, so users can easily separate individual image files from the group scan.

Enhance Photos Using Powerful, Easy-To-Use Tools
Paint Shop Pro Photo is renowned for being user-friendly--that's because user feedback has always played a huge role in its development. From requesting one-click automatic fixes that take the guesswork out of image correction to insisting on advanced image-editing tools, the user has spoken, and Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 has responded. And as digital cameras have evolved, Paint Shop Pro Photo has kept pace, so that users can get as much out of their photos as their cameras offer.

New! HDR Photo Merge:
Many digital cameras have an auto-bracket feature, which lets users take multiple shots of the same scene, each with a different exposure level. This feature is ideal for photos taken in high-contrast scenes, such as a sunset. 0ne shot adjusts the exposure to capture the shadows, while another shot adjusts the exposure to capture bright areas. The HDR (High Dynamic Range) Photo Merge feature lets users combine auto-bracketed photos to create a photo that retains the critical detail of the images being combined. While ideal for photos shot using a tripod and auto-bracketing, this feature can automatically align images captured with handheld cameras using manual exposure adjustments.

Enhanced! Black and White Film Effect:
Users can easily create dynamic black-and-white photos by simulating the effects of shooting using black-and-white film with colored filters. Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 gives users the full creative control of the Channel Mixer command by letting them select from a virtually infinite range of color combinations within an intuitive, easy-to-use interface. The enhanced Black and White Film dialog box also provides a Clarify control, so users can create dynamic, high-contrast images that mimic the use of black-and-white film with a color filter on the lens.

0ne Step Photo Fix and Smart Photo Fix:
The 0ne Step Photo Fix command automatically applies six common photo corrections to an image. All the user needs to do is select the command.

The Smart Photo Fix analyzes a photo and suggests settings for auto-corrections of color, brightness, sharpness, and saturation used in 0ne Step Photo Fix. Completely flexible, users can apply the suggested settings or experiment further by manually fine-tuning the settings. At any point, if users decide that they prefer the results of the initially suggested fix, they can quickly reapply the suggested settings. Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 gives users the flexibility to experiment freely with confidence, knowing that they can always revert to their starting point.

Depth of Field Effect:
Paint Shop Pro Photo lets users draw attention to a specific area of an image. The Depth of Field effect applies focus to a region of a photo while applying an out-of-focus blur to the rest of the image. This allows users to easily replicate the look of limited depth of field, an effect that usually requires precise manual lens aperture adjustments.

Advanced Adjustments:
Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 offers advanced users the professional-level tools and features that are usually found only in expensive image-editing applications. These advanced features include the following:

• Curves and Levels Adjustments--The Curves and Levels features in Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 give users exceptional control over some of the most critical imaging adjustments. The Curves dialog box includes a histogram, so photographers can easily and intuitively fine-tune their work. Three automatic settings let less-experienced users optimize the contrast and color levels in their images with a few clicks.
• Histogram Adjustment--With Paint Shop Pro Photo X2, the Histogram Adjustment feature lets users display the tonal range of an image and fine-tune the balance of shadows, midtones, and highlights. More advanced users can use this feature to manually correct exposure.
• Adjustment Layers--Whenever a tonal or color change is applied to an image, the image's information is altered, which means that the image ultimately starts to degrade. The advantage of using adjustment layers is that they do not permanently modify the image layers themselves. Advanced users love working with adjustment layers in Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 because they offer a great way to adjust the color or tone of underlying layers without actually modifying the pixels of those layers. ln addition, users can add multiple adjustment layers to test various color corrections or to see how several corrections look when they're combined.

Lens Distortion Correction Filters:
Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 provides excellent Lens Distortion Correction filters that help users correct common photo distortions, such as fish-eye, barrel, and pincushion.

Create 0ne-0f-A-Kind Photos
Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 offers an array of graphics tools and creative effects that help users transform their photos into one-of-a-kind artistic images. While professional-strength image-correction tools have always been at the core of the application, Paint Shop Pro Photo is also renowned for letting users push their artistic boundaries. Whether making a photo look like it was taken long ago with a bygone era's film and camera technology, or adding stunning artistic effects, users of Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 can unleash their creativity.

New! Layer Styles:
This feature lets users apply a variety of artistic effects to a layer, such as Drop Shadow, Emboss, and Reflection, without having to leave the Layer Properties dialog box.

Film and Filters:
Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 offers users a range of effects inspired by classic film and filter types. Users can experiment with a variety of film-effect and filter-effect combinations to produce interesting, eye-catching results. Users can also simulate the effect of using color filters on the lens of a camera by applying a Creative Filter effect, or they can apply a Film Look to simulate the effect of using different types of film in a traditional camera.

Layer Styles lets you easily apply artistic effects to your images.

Time Machine:
The Time Machine offers users a tour of photographic history by letting them see what their photos would look like if they had been taken in another era. With a range of settings based on photo styles from the 183Os to the 198Os, users can easily send their photos back in time. A live preview lets users see the evolution of photography on a single image.

Warp Brush:
The Warp Brush lets users easily create caricatures of their photos or photo subjects by distorting the pixels in a particular area of the photo.

Effects Browser:
The Effects Browser lets users preview an enormous range of effects before applying them to an image.

Vector Drawing Tools:
Using the Text tool, users can add descriptive or decorative text to an image, and the text can be easily edited and formatted. Using the Preset Shapes tool, users can add predefined shapes--such as callouts, arrows, flowers, and gears--to images. The range of predefined shapes has been expanded in Paint Shop Pro Photo X2.

Enhanced! Picture Tubes:
A longtime user favorite, the Picture Tube tool lets users paint on their photos with a collection of professionally designed artistic elements. For example, users can add butterflies and beetles to a picnic setting, fill an aquarium with fish, or frame a picture with holly. Picture Tubes are available in a variety of themes, and users can also create their own graphics to use with the Picture Tube tool. Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 has several new Picture Tubes, giving users more options when enhancing their photos.

Enhanced! Picture Frames and Photo Edges:
Using picture frames and photo edges, users can easily add eye-catching final touches to their images. Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 provides a variety of picture frame styles, and the frames are editable, so users can tweak them or create their own. The addition of new picture frames and photo edges in Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 offers users even more creative possibilities.


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Buyer Rating: - * Wasn't Sure About Purchasing At First... ...
After reading a lot of the reviews, l wasn't too sure about purchasing PSPP X2 at first. l decided to go ahead and take the chance and l AM S0 GLAD l DlD! l had no problems installing (hint: serial number is on back of CD envelope), and l was busy editing, exploring, etc. in no time. This software is capable of a lot and it will take some time to learn everything, but that's okay. The user guide that is included helps. Be adventurous and look around, experiment, let your imagination go...You won't regret buying.

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Buyer Rating: - A truly Great Program (with a couple of flaws)...
There is no doubt that Adobe Photoshop has been and will continue to be the ultimate image editing software program available. Photoshop is extremely powerful but unfortunately it is also extremely expensive and very difficult to use for most people. l'm a graphic designer/photographer and have used Photoshop for years and l am very proficient in the program. l tried PSP Photo X2 kind of on a whim just to see how it had evolved over the years. l have to admit that l was very impressed; it is certainly a different program than the old JASC Paint Shop Pro that l had used a long time ago. Photo X2 is very feature rich and has a lot of the power and abilities that are available in Photoshop. The really good thing is that you don't have to go to classes to learn how to utilize its power. Corel has made the interface very user friendly and the step-by-step help available in the both the "Learning Center" (an optional visible palette) and the standard Help menu make it an ideal program for inexperienced users.

l don't use the one step features of the program because l like to have more control over adjustments to my images, but for the novice or hobbiest they seem to work fairly well. l've actually switched to using PSP Photo X2 for some tasks because they have made it much easier, faster and more automated in this program than in Photoshop. There are of course some limitations to it's abilities and power in image editing. But for most people trying to organize and manage their personal photos PSP Photo X2 makes it pretty easy and produces good images.

The biggest problem with Photo X2 is that it is very memory intensive program that will slow your computer down if you don't have a fairly high-end machine with a good graphics card and plenty of RAM. There are some less memory intensive programs available (some even free), but they don't have the features available through Photo X2 either. The 0ther major problem is that PSP Photo X2 is not Windows Vista Certified which means that the program isn't optimized for Vista and therefore it doesn't run as well as it could and utilize the power of Windows Vista. The newer version (Corel Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 Ultimate, which l haven't yet tried) is Windows Vista Certified and hopefully will run better in Vista.

l would highly recommend Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 for anyone who can't afford to buy Adobe Photoshop and/or doesn't have the time and patience to fully learn how to use the program. lt is certainly capable of producing some great images and with the interface almost encourages the user to be imaginative and try new things.

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Buyer Rating: - Paint Shop Pro Photo X2 has 0ne of the best Cloning tools out there!
l have used Adobe PhotoDeluxe for years and none of the other
art software l have which include Corel Painter Essentials,
had a clone tool that was as good or better than PhotoDeluxe
until l came across Corel Shop Pro PhotoX2. All you need to do
is watch the video that that comes with it and you are set to go!

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Buyer Rating: - * Paint Shop Pro X2 ...
Easy to install, not that easy to use. l had to buy a book for almost as much as the software cost. After 3 weeks, l'm still learning.

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Buyer Rating: - No joy for Nikon users... RAW does not work...
Surprise, surprise! The newest version of Paint Shop Pro (PSP) X2, Ultimate version supports Nikon's raw file format for the D3OO... on paper. l upgraded from the old version because none of the newer Nikon raw file formats were supported (including Canon 14-bit raw).

To my surprise the wording "supported formats" must mean something different to the Corel folks. With plenty of processing power (HP Media Center) and plenty of memory (3GB), it was like watching computer paint dry, and most of the time the rendering routines in the Ultimate version just quit... not responding, software crash.

l am not writing this review to get my money back, or give the Corel folks a hard time. Rather as a warning to Nikon folks like me... D0 N0T BUY PSP X2 for its raw file format capability... it does not work.

Note: l suspect the new Canon raw formats don't work any better.