PhotoShop Elements 2.0

hiya does anyone no whether photoshop elements 2.0 or paint shop pro 7 or Photo impression would be ok designing clothes on templates? if any of them work please tell me how i do it thanks xx

PSE 2.0 is pretty old and weak, but it will work to a degree for SL stuff. I'm not sure if it supports alpha channels, which if it doesn't, would be a tremendous hindrance. You won't be able to create transparency without alpha channels. I'd suggest you follow the PSE 3/4 tutorial in the transparency guide at the top of the forum, and see if it works. If it does, you should be okay. If not, you're better off not using it.

PSP 7 should be okay. I don't really have much experience with it, except I do seem to remember its interface was pretty wacky. If I'm remembering correctly PSP began to mimic the Photoshop style interface with version 8. Before that, it was pretty much in its own little universe. It should do the job, but it may be difficult to find tutorial information for it. It is almost seven years out of date at this point.

PhotoImpression, as far as I know, is not suitable for SL work. I don't think it can read PSD files, which is essential in order to use the Linden templates. I'm not sure if it even supports layers, and judging by what painfully little technical info is available on ArcSoft's website, I don't think it can do transparency at all. I've never used it though, so I could be wrong.


All the programs you mentioned are pretty sub-par, just so you know. If you can afford it, I'd highly recommend Photoshop. If you want a cheaper alternative, the newest version of PSE will work pretty well, or a modern version PSP will certainly do the job. If you want to go the free route, simply download GIMP. The interface is garbage, but the program itself is very powerful, more than capable of doing what you need for SL.

Yes, PSP seven will be able to handle it provided you know the interface. It was weak in comparison to 8 which has good additions. If you only have the choose of the three, go with PSP. if you can try for PSP 0 or 11. I can't say anythinga bout elements, I don't ue it as CS2 is the professional version that Adobe releases.

You can try Paint.NET as well, if you prefer something free and has a conventional uncluttered Windows interface (as compared to GIMP). The program is rudimentary, but is good enough for doing basic clothing and most image editing work.

I use it in the office on workstations that do not have Photoshop, as something to get by with.

http://www.getpaint.net/

Please ignore the statement at the top of the website tho.

Good suggestion, Cottonteil. I've never used Paint.net, so I often forget it even exists. I'll have to give it a try one of these days. From the website, it looks pretty impressive for what it is.


Hehe. Yes, horrible statement.

Photoshop Elements 2.0 will do alpha channels and layers, same as the instructions for versions 4 and 5 in the sticky tutorials. So far it has been able to do everything I have needed to do related to Second Life, and at a very resonable cost.

could you point me to those sticky tutorials for Photoshop Elements 5.0?

Thanks

See those big orange post titles at the top of this forum with word "Sticky" in bright red letters next to each of them?

Chosen, I wish you would use different words here. Maybe, "Some people hate the interface," or something. I think if you look through old posts, you will find that many people dislike the PSP interface, and prefer the Gimp interface. There are lots of reasons this might be so. Also, there is GimpShop, which is Gimp with the interface tweaked to make it as much like PSP as possible.

As for the original question, Elements 2 doesn't really do channels very well. Not really suitable for SL, compared to other alternatives.

If you have a problem with my stating my own opinion, I cordially invite you not to read my posts. I don't see any reason to soften my wordings with that "in the opinions of many" stuff. I'm not a journalist, after all. I have no obligation to neutrality in what I say.

I AM one of the "many" who are "of the opinon", and as such I have no reservations about saying so. I personally feel that the GIMP interface is really terrible, so that's how I describe it. There's nothing wrong with that.

If you want to know why I feel that way about GIMP, by the way I've got no problem telling you that either. It's non standard, and in many ways, nonsensical. If you know Photoshop, you can learn PSP or Photopaint or any other commercial raster editor extremely quickly, since they all follow established conventions, but not GIMP. The only way to learn GIMP is to start completely over.

The problem GIMP has always had is that it's designed by programmers for programmers, with little or no regard to how artists actually think and work. GIMPshop helps a little by renaming things to more standard titles, but the organization remains far from seeming sensible if you're used to any other program.

Again, transitioning between popular commercial raster editors is typically easy and painless, but transitioning from any of them to GIMP or vise versa is very difficult. I have yet to meet anyone who disagrees with that assessment.

I've been saying for a long time that what GIMP needs is for someone to do with it what Mozilla did with Firefox, which is take all that open source material, and put it in a really nice, easy to understand package. If and when that ever happens, GIMP will become something really special. Until then, I have to keep saying what I've always said about it, which is that the interface absolutely sucks (it really, really does), but I still applaud the program and its creators for delivering so much power for free.

For what it's worth, I didn't want to commit to an expensive program right off the bat, so I picked up a used copy of PSP 8 for $30. Frankly, PSP XI isn't much more expensive (I think it goes for about $70, and has a free trial download that works for 30 days).

When I told people I was looking for an inexpensive program that could do clothes, many told me about GIMP. I have to admit, though, I looked at it and was completely confused. But I'm not very technically savvy--for those more computer literate, it might work better.

In general, PSP 8 works, but can be glitchy with transparencies (I started a thread about this a week ago if you're curious about the particulars). But I haven't had much trouble making basic clothing with it. It will get you started, and help you decide if you like this hobby enough to invest in a better program (me, I'm taking a PS class next semester half just to get the class software discount...)