I think the software is very nice to look at and very slick, but it's all fir coat and no knickers. It doesn't really do a lot. I will keep it but there are better one's.

I have a quad core 2.5 Ghz Intel processor with 4Gig of ram and a 2TB hard drive.

I installed this softwares, fast and easy active. But when open the software, it becomes frozen and does nothing. And at last I have to "force quit" by tast manager.

Earlier, "... I’m running Win7-64, with 6 gig ram, and an I5 level 2 quad core processor,… Light Developer runs quite fast…perhaps those people need to junk their little xp 512 machines and get with the 21st. century ..."

Light Developer does not sell computers, they sell software!

FREE Picasa, FREE Irfanview, and good old Photoshop v7 run just fine on a 512 MB 750 MHz XP PC, and as a photographer running out for the day, taking along such a old cheap reliable PC is perfect for downloading my CF cards in the field, and the above programs give me immediate on-screen review of the day's shoot.

Cheap.

THAT is Light Developer's competition, and compared to that, Light Developer does not shine.

However, on my in-studio computers that have multi core processors and gigs of Ram, Light Develop still cannot read my Raw files, and crashes irretrievably.

I have more than one computer, and prefer programs that do not discriminate, that do not force me to learn something different for each because the program is inelegantly designed as a system respources hog, and then return nothing for all that heavy lifting.

Earlier, "... Another user is missing the file extensions – they are -explicitly highlighted- in front of the file name (in thumbnail view); a nice solution for shortened long filenames ..."

ONLY for recognized files, but not for my Raw digital image files, so the program won't even help me identify what digital image files it fails to read, hence my request that any program offer complete listing, search, sort, and selecting capabilities instead of only one view: extensionless thumbnails, in my case, extensionless blank thumbnails.

I've had limited time to work with this, but so far I think it's great...of course it's not Photoshop, but for simple and quick stuff it's much better than many other applications I have. I LOVE the dark interface...so easy on the eyes...to those people complaining about it's darkness, I ask..How old are you, about 108?...I'm 53 and I have no problem with it being dark! -- Some people complain that it is slow...I'm running Win7-64, with 6 gig ram, and an I5 level 2 quad core processor,... Light Developer runs quite fast...perhaps those people need to junk their little xp 512 machines and get with the 21st. century.

download and installed fine on windows 7 professional 32 bit
when i'm trying to do matting, it cannot process the image, unexpected error occurred when processing the image....

Crashed when I tried to open a photo. System was wiped which may or may not be related to the program since my mom was playing games on facebook shortly beforehand. Windows 7 64 bit.

I liked the interface, and how many apps have a default Descreen
and post spot metering ? I've been using Photoshop since 1999 and I
found it refreshing compared to how greedy Lightroom is.

I really don't understand all the hate about this tool. (Okay, that's the usual way a lot of people are "reviewing" here...)

It's a harmless photo editing tool, like many others.
The GUI looks a bit different, but there is nothing you can't figure out after a short check of all icons.
Users are missing photoshop plugins - they should have a look at the installed folders. They can add all the millions of .8bf files they have collected in the past (as long as they are 32 bit versions).

Another user is missing the file extensions - they are -explicitly highlighted- in front of the file name (in thumbnail view); a nice solution for shortened long filenames.

A help file should always be included in a programme for off-line access. Though I'm not a fan of video tutorials, they could be an online offer. Otherwise users will moan about the too big download-file.

I had no problems with installing and running the programme. No crashes or error messages.
In the same moment I launched the software, the thumbnails were visible, no long time for loading; processing was fast too.

I couldn't compare it to all my other photo tools yet, and had not the time to even check out all options, but I know Light Developer will stay in my toolbox.

Would I pay $ 79.- for it? No.


Thanks to Stepok Image Lab for joining the project and thanks to GOTD for finding this programme.

graylox

Win 7 / 64

So, this is like fotoshopp? Thank! :->

Installed fine on win/vista sp2 seems to work good at filtering jpgs ,but the save function does not work properly.Program prompts you to save copy of pic befour exiting prog. so you go to save a copy and click here and so on, but when you close out program it says that you have not saved a copy of the jpg that you just saved a copy of a second earlier. Very stupid.. such a basic thing to do, but does not seem to work right.

Installed and worked flawlessly on Win7 Pro x64. Found images very quickly. Immediately was able to identify and use features - great UI. Would like to see incremental undo steps inside of some features, rather than have to cancel and start over with the feature. Did not find a way to apply a brush using filter effects (overlay, lighten, darken, color, etc.) and would really like to see that. I didn't see an add watermark feature, either, and that would be great. Brush seemed laggy. Extremely pleased with the results - actually restored a photo I thought was beyond salvation - and would definitely recommend this program.

5 minutes into editing a jpg in MATTING (inside/outside) and CRASH.

Possible bug:
Window will only maximizes to size of the smallest screen. In my case I have a much larger monitor attached to a laptop. The program only maximizes to the size of the laptop screen, not the 22" WXGA monitor.

I use Lightroom and Photoshop at home, being a part time pro photographer, I'm used to using those types of programs, so I'll play around with this and give it a fair shake. I'm going to use this at my full-time day job (IT Administrator), but have not had the time to put it through its paces today.

As an average or even below average user as far as familiarity with Photoshop and dark room type programs this was my experience - Found the download and installation easy. The program looks fun to play with, and that's what I usually do, play around with programs like this, using them to create images for hobbies such as poetry books and art images for use in various capacities.

Unfortunately, I came to a standstill when I simply needed to find an "Undo" type button after scribbling with one of the brushes. Couldn't find it anywhere, no help menu, so closed it up.

I'll play with this again later, and it looks like an interesting and fun interface. I'll probably figure out some tricks I like to do with this program, but I can't report a particularly positive experience since either my own stupidity and the programs lack of a basic help menu didn't allow me to basically get past square one.

Thanks GAOTD and developers, I appreciate the opportunity to be exposed to the program, but I can't say I could recommend it one way or another.

Light Developer is Different
Installed and ran with Windows 7 64bit HP laptop and NVIDIA graphics. Although I haven't fully tested every aspect of this program it is fairly intuitive in its design and functionality. The algorithms used to "develop" such as sharpening, highlighting, shadowing, defog, etc. are of high quality and don't appear to be "off the shelf" knockoffs. In a matter of minutes I was able to take a smart phone image that was pathetic and transform it, including the dynamic range and actual sharpness (not unsharp mask) to publishable quality. NOTICE This program does require a relatively powerful computer to run properly. Thank you GOTD and the makers of Light Developer.

Although I used to do professional photography in my younger days I can't make the claim of being a pro anymore. I do, however, still do a lot of photography and I feel qualified in posting my opinion. I can't under any circumstances see this as being worth $79, it just doesn't have the features and it's poorly arranged. Gimp and paint.net are in my opinion much better and free.

Installed and registered without problems on Win 7 64-bit.

Got the 32-bit version :(

Light Developer is impressive at first sight. I like dark interfaces as I find them less straining on the eyes. But it will not be to everyone's liking and unfortunately I can't find an option to change the interface skin. The rest of the interface itself is eye-candy all over. Lots of fancy (3D) transition effects between windows and the visual mouse click effect really gives you the feel that it belongs on a touchscreen tablet. With so much eye-candy you'd expect it to be a resource hog but that is actually not the case, basic transitions and interaction take about ~2% with 2GB RAM, not bad. The real-time rendering is laggy though and spikes the CPU.

But still it has its quirks, when dragging and dropping a photo is simply placed in the current listing rather than opening it for editing or even just navigating to the containing folder. Toolsetting windows jump from left to right which is counter-intuitive. The 'Undo' button doesn't always show for every action and that's just plain weird. There are also buttons in the top toolbar that imho belong in either one of the side toolbars, like the 'What's wrong' button should be in the left toolbar. There are buttons that change position. It also refuses to minimize if a childwindow is open in the main window. I've also spotted a few very awkward translations here and there...

Light Developer focuses on photo retouching and enhancement so if you're looking to create your own graphics from scratch, this won't do. But for managing your photo collection it has (almost) everything you'd need as far as I can tell. Viewing and editing of Exif data, working with RAW files, merging, splitting, all the touch-up tools you'd expect, batch processing etc. The 'What's wrong' wizard is a single entry point to all kinds of basic photo operations. I 'defogged' an old and blurry photo and the result was stunning, much better than I expected. Its default settings already produce good results as far as I can tell.

Light Developer's quirky interface certainly needs rethinking and redesigning and at least needs different skins, this doesn't offer enough contrast for a lot of people (= potential customers). Although it produces better results than I expected, its interface frustrates a natural workflow. Even at half the price I'd still consider it overpriced given the current state it's in. There's software for less (or free) that simply out-performs Light Developer. So it's not an attractive deal for home users and hobbyists and a non-contender for the professional market.

As a giveaway it's a nice keeper though. Thanks anyway GOTD and Stepok Image Lab.

@Steve: The saturated field argument is becoming stale, because how many of those tons of freebies actually measure up to the GOTD offer in terms of features and functionality? Once you start looking at it that way, the field turns out to be far less saturated as some make it out to be. In this particular case there's only one that immediately springs to mind and that's RawTherapee (Picasa doesn't offer nearly as much editing options as this GOTD). And freeware isn't always free because as soon as you want to use it in a business setting, purchasing a license is often still required. Even the GOTD license is limited to strictly personal usage.

@ post 35, Francis: Apologies, Francis. . . I must've been dozing off here when I inadvertently referred to Sagelight's free trial period as 3 months instead of 30 days.

Re your hopes of Sagelight as an Advent giveaway. . . well, there ain't no harm in being optimistic, but Sagelight is currently on a special lifetime license promotion of $40 USD (£25 GBP) against Adobe Lightroom 4's £107 GBP (in the UK, equivalent to a staggering $170 USD -- though Adobe is renowned for disadvantaging UK-based customers) so as at that price it's demolishing Adobe's offering, I doubt even the brilliant folks who run GAOTD can manage Sagelight as a 24-hour freebie. . .

Installed on XP Pro sp3 x86 AMD 3000xp 2gb ram OK "Crashed on trying to run"
Any Help?
On their Website they have both 32 & 64 bit Installers.

chas

http://www.stepok.com/previous.htm shows that Light Developer is an update to the chinese photo software Turbo Photo and Recomposit which are no longer sold. They had "lifetime free upgrades", really!

No Light Developer test found by google.

http://www.stepok.com/Features/noisereduction.htm shows comparison of effects to some other programs unknown to me but also some Light Developer's results.

As always, KUDOs to the GAOTD staff, You guys are something special.

Not so, "Light Developer". Installed fine in Vista. Liked the easy activation, it happened with no human intervention. Opened the program, and when I tried to use it, everything it did was stagy. Do you remember the 56K modem downloads on the internet? I thought I had regressed to 1985. Shades of "Back to the Future". I closed the program before it finished opening the second photo and immediately uninstalled it. The uninstall seemed to go well.

For a $79 piece of software this thing should do more than underwhelm me.

Win 7/64-bit Installed fine. Locks up immediately on execution.

Found in internet:
Stepok.com
Shutongjie,Jinniuqu
Chengdu
Sichuan 610036
China

#27
Sagelight 30-day trial period only not 3 months: http://www.sagelighteditor.com/downloadtrial.html

We all hope Sagelight will become an advent giveaway, older version is welcome (my opinion!). Please GOTD try your best!

Hi, All I can say at this early stage after looking at this Photo Tool (not to mention it's rather "bold" Home Page..) - It's, err, different?:)

I was especially amused when figuring out how to work on a chosen photo as double-clicking on it didn't, as expected, take that photo out of an Album to be placed in "tool environment" - but instead, clicking on Album icon brought more tool buttons - again, not immediately obvious, "Dev it!" - did the trick. Smiling further, lol, I found a little window untitled: "What's wrong" - explaining features and functions, together with buttons associated with each of the plugins..Rather modest and "basic" for that matter - till perhaps more can be discovered, till I find something really useful that will "wow" me over, hard to tell after spending less than half an hour on it.

Few immediate "dislikes" - Top of the Program's windows hides under my taskbar (those who have it at the bottom of desktop might not notice, or miss something else instead?), and second one - awkward (double) exit from Program, first from single photo, next from whole Album still "hanging" there..On next visit to that Program additional message came on saying I didn't exit it properly, do I want to continue where I left it..(I was under impression I left my photo unchanged and simply wanted out)

I must say, for me personally, all of it brings a certain change to what I'm accustom to, hence sticking to that label I gave it earlier on: "It's different" alright, lol. Don't know if "Dev it!", or "what's wrong" suppose to be funky:), or tacky..Yes, I know, Dev refers to the name of the Software (so don't try to.. corel it!:), and "what's wrong" is a way of reminding that no photo is perfect I suppose?
I could be in less jovial mood after spending nearly $80.., far to steep IMHO, but as a Gift - I appreciate it's appearance here and wish Stepok Image Lab wise future.
Thanks GAOTD and Light Developer.

Windows 7 Pro 64-bit.

Installed, started immediately, but all I got was the spinning circle meaning it was not responding.

Clicked on the Interface and the dialog box popped up stating This program is not responding.........End process. What choice do I have but to click OK.

Others are not having this problem, maybe it's in my configuration.

At least I was able to copy the Photoshop plugins to my Paint Shop Pro plugins directory.

For those of you who think the skin is too dark, you can modify the graphics in the C:\Program Files (x86)\Light Developer\skin directory.

This is my first GOAD program that crashed on start up in years.

I was on the fence about trying this program but the comments swayed me to give it a shot. I'm glad I did. User interface needs some work but this is a helpful program overall and has features that Photoscape doesn't. If you're looking for something with more horsepower than most of the free photo editors out there, but not as difficult to use as Adobe or GIMP, this could be it. Thanks to all those that take the time to leave feedback. It's always great to get other's viewpoints.

LightDeveloper is basic in its entire concept, execution and user interface. At just under 80 bucks, my heart tells me there is something wrong. Having RawTherapy right next to me in comparison to LightDeveloper, the features offered in this very expensive software vs. a low-cost/no-cost alternative.

I really think, either I had a bad day or this is something annoying or something that makes me feel I get fooled around into believing that LightDeveloper is worth every single penny...

Sorry, but I have to say firmly NO to this. NO, this software isn't any near as good as Gimp, RawTherapy etc.

To the developer of LightDeveloper
Either you change the price dramatically within reach of 15 Dollars or make it OpenSource.
other recommendations include to switch from GDI+ to DirectX or OpenGL for better performance. Change the graphical user interface (rant and rave)

It's great to get an uncomplicated download...Installed and launched without a hitch.
I tried the program for just a few minutes and it is easy to see that there is a lot of potential in this software...It requires a little time and a tutorial overview would help a lot.
For me it's a keeper and thank you Gotd...

How do I say this nicely?

I appreciate that programmers do their best trying to bring something swell to the end user, and they deserve thanks and appreciation for that.

Now, programmers, please, please, -p-l-e-a-s-e-:

Pretend that you have used a computer before, and
pretend that your end user audience has used a computer before.

So ...

MENU: please put a menu bar in view all the time that is logically structured to contain every feature your program has to offer.

KEYBOARD: please make your menu bar available via the keyboard, such as [ Alt ][ F ] File, then [ S ] Save, or [ A ] Save As, and so on.

MOUSE: -p-l-e-a-s-e- make every place we can place our mouse have a left-click and right-click menu allowing us to inspect and control the thing we are pointing at.

Please let us know when you have accomplished those minimum standards before releasing your next version for us to test.

Thank you very much.

See also prior posts on GOTD about allowing us to resize windows, with the ability to view the entire contents of what we are looking at inside the windows, and allowing us to take action on each item displayed.

==========

Now, regarding this program's three (or more) strikes: I presume the programmers want feedback, so here goes:

1 - If you don't want to work with less than 2 GB RAM, then say that before proceeding with install. It installed but failed to run on my 512 MB PC, yet installed and ran on my 1 GB PC, so I presume we're just dealing with bloated programming and lack of install pre-check.

But, how do I recover from perpetual crashing "... Light Developer has encountered a problem and needs to close. We are sorry for the inconvenience ..." during program load on even a 4 GB PC, I'll never know unless the programmers respond here.

I uninstalled and reinstalled it, but it appears to have inherited the prior version's defaults even after uninstall. I had changed the default directory to C:\DCIM instead of C:\My Documents\My Pictures, and the new re-install tries to load C:\DCIM even after removing the first version of the program and reinstalling a new one fresh -- go figure.

So, it crashes on load, and I cannot change settings, and I cannot test it further, but then, why would I want to test it further?

2 - If you're going to "develop" any image file as if you were in a chemical darkroom working with undeveloped film, then handle any Raw image file out there, especially the billions of legacy Raw files in dozens of Raw formats from cameras that still work and work well, Raw image files that FREE Picasa and FREE IrfanView handle without hesitation. Your program doesn't recognize my thousands and thousands of legacy Minolta Raw files, so again, why bother with your program?

3 - You do not allow us to view file lists in any format but thumbnails, you do not allow us to , search, re-sort, and select results through any displayed list, you do not show file name extensions, so how are we to manage different formats of the same file, such as JPG and TIF and PSD and Raw copies of the same filename?

4 - Your web site offers 32 and 64 bit versions, but GOTD only says this version works in 32 and 64 bit environments, so I presume this is only the 32 bit version.

5 - Price wise, Corel's AfterShot Pro for $40 has no such failures, reads all Raw files, has excellent noise reduction AND lens corrections, all manually controllable or automatic if we choose not to spend time tweaking individual files, and is -w-a-y- less expensive than $80 Stepok Light Developer. Trial: http://apps.corel.com/lp/aftershot/download/index.html

Off it goes. Please let us know when you've addressed our concerns, especially my own litany above.

@ Soren Christensen, # 14: Seeing as you claim to be a "professional photographer", how about giving everyone here the reasons -- in your expert opinion -- why this software is the "best and excellent alternative to other professional photo programs"? Or are you another fantasist who comes on here, peddling day-dreams that help neither the GAOTD community nor the developer?

As a retired semi-pro photographer who has worked with digital post-processing since Adobe's Photoshop 5 around 15 years ago, I'm well aware of what's out there in the marketplace as both freeware and commercial ware. Photoshop continues to deliver everything that's needed for post-processing, but also continues to be a massive over-kill in terms of price and facilities for the ordinary average home camera user: it costs too much; it does too much.

Today's GAOTD is pitched at those who, very sensibly, want image management software better tailored to their needs and their pockets. I thought I'd give this a little run through, so-oo. . .

This is the first time I've ever experienced difficulties with a GAOTD download. I wound up with a 3.14MB set-up, 6.33MB .gcd wraspper, and a 1kb text file. All that set-up achieved was to open a GOATD activation confirmed web page. The software installer didn't run at all. Two further attempts to achieve this with a fresh download achieved nothing either, so I went to the developer's site and DL'd from there.

Initial encounter with Light Developer was anything but impressive. Far from looking like an alternative to expensive pro software like Photoshop CS, it acted like it thought it was Picasa, opening the 'My Pictures' folder and populating the screen with image after image in which I've no interest at all. Any work-in-progress that I have is contained in Photography/Year/Month folder/sub-folders in C: My Documents.

Ignoring the Picasa-find-everything-and-show-all time-wasting routine, I used Windows Explorer to select an image file I'd like to look at / work on, and right-clicked to see if Light Developer appeared as an "open with" option. It didn't. I could always waste yet more time, going into C: Programs to make a shortcut to the executable. . . but really, this kind of context-sensitive omission is pretty naff in software retailing at $79.

After eventually getting to the image I wished to work on, Light Developer came up with an array of tools and options, the righthand side of the screen looking like a stripped-down early Photoshop version and the left, a stripped-down version of Photoshop's biggest rival (see later), a selection of various sliders and adjustments -- some of which, sadly, were not helped by bizarre translations of their function from the original German into English, viz: Enhance dynamic by bleding defog result. Er yes. Well.

Putting the image through various standard post-processing routines certainly showed how versatile this program is -- but unfortunately, how unintuitive it can often be: commendably lightweight though it is, there's a heck of a learning curve involved.

As to results? Generally, they're very good -- once you've figured out how to navigate around the program and have mastered its options and tools. But. . . and this really is a BIG "but". . .

The time taken to master Light Developer is only going to be worth it if the retail price of Light Developer is worth it. And it isn't. Free today though it may be, the prospect of having to fork out $79 for a re-install is. . . Absurd.

And the reason why it's absurd is because at $79, Light Developer is directly up against an image management program that's so far beyond Light Developer's class that comparison between the two is downright. . . Embarrassing.

That other program is, of course, Sagelight Image Editor, the go-to software of any photographer who can't be bothered with Photoshop CS and would like something that in many respects out-performs Photoshop anyway. Sagelight has been years in development and is backed by one of the best user forums around. It also has by far the best help, best context-sensitive operating routines, best video instructions and, well. . . It leaves all other pro software standing when it comes to learning-as-you-use:

http://www.sagelighteditor.com/

Currently, Sagelight is on offer at half the price of Light Developer. There's also a 90-day full program free trial available, so it's possible for any GAOTDer here today to download and run and compare Light Editor and Sagelight side-by-side and make her or his own decision.

To me, there's actually no contest. Light Player is a genuine attempt to provide a software program in the semi-premium class but at $79 is flattened by Sagelight at one end of the market and freeware Photoscape at the other. Taking time to master it as today's freebie makes sense only if it's likely to be a $79 keeper at the inevitable re-install time. . . and at $79, it's $50 too much.

Thanks, then, GAOTD and the developer, but no thanks.

Installed the software without any problems.

The software is very slick and easy for most to jump in and start working on photo's.

I give it a thumbs up!

There are some things that are easier in this program than in PSE or PSP and so for those I would use it. Example: unlock aspect ration so I can tweak to fit a matte size. I like the side by side comparison; thumbnail samples filters for quick selection. Saving the photo in various sizes, nice if you want to save a small avatar. Would I suggest it to my daughter who hates complicated photo processing, yes. Would I pay $79 for this program NO, PSP-x5 is less and does PS competitive work. As a program that is a freebee or $20, well ok, but there lots of freebees that are quite good. Will I keep it on my machine? Probably.

Installed and crashed
Windows 8 64bit

I'm not sure what I'm missing. I am certainly not a graphics novice, but I still don't have any idea what this program actually does. If its a relatively simple graphic image creation program like so many others, (including lots of freeware out there), then the price is way out-of-line at $79.00.

But I get the feeling it must be more than that. We are implying it is slightly similar to Adobe's Lightroom, which presumably is more than a Windows Paint-like program. It must have something to do with 3D and angular lighting effects? But it just doesn't say that. If it only does things like eliminate red-eye from a photo and reduce noise levels, then again, it is overpriced, and there are a million of them available, including for free.

So I'd ask for a much more complete description of what we are actually looking at here. Unless one downloads and installs everything from GAOTD, it just doesn't tell you enough to make a judgment call on whether its something useful for you.

Last but not least, I know creating Help Files is a chore. Been there, done that. But online 'HTML Help' will never replace one that is available on the local machine.

Just my 2 cents..
Happy Thanksgiving Folks!

I am not a professional photographer just a novice who likes to tweak his photos and images.

My first impressions are very good. I can see the developers have spent a lot of time enhancing the visual elements of their software which makes the experiencing of using there product that much better.

The editing option are very good and are very easy to use/understand and are enough to keep me busy.

It has a very small foot print in regards to memory and CPU usage which is nice to see and installed on a Windows 8 (64bit)machine without error.

Big thanks to the developers and GOTD.

I also want to see that black background improved. While it serves a purpose by allowing for a neutral work surface, with darker pictures, it makes it harder to detect edges.

The menu is also a *tad* inadequate.

Basic enhancement OK, but not worth $79 (unless we are being misled about the difference in functionality).

Installed and registered in Win 8 x64 with no problems. I really like this program. I have Lightroom 4 and it is way too technical for people who want to shoot a scene and clean it up a bit in under a minute. This program works for me. I tried out most of the features and they do work very well. That is how much less intensive it is than LR4. It would take a day or two to check out all it's features. I like that it has an in-paint function but that did not work nearly as well as Inpaint does because you can not select the area of image that you want to insert. For me this is way better than Lightroom 4 which is very demanding of time and skill, of which I have neither. For most or all us point and shooters this is an excellent free program. Thank you GOTD.

This program is so good that it can find the pics I had hidden behind the supposedly impenetrable barrier of one of the softwares offered sometime ago in this place. My PC crashed I reinstalled everything I could but not that particular program so my files remained hidden (theoretically). Do the exercise and be surprised.

To the poster who asked in the How would you improve Light Developer? about adding your own Photoshop plugins, browse to the folder where you installed Light Developer and you'll find a Photoshop Plugins folder where you can add your own *.8bf files. HTH.

I opened a folder with 2000 pictures in it - this program only allows 512 pictures and suggested using sub folders - got the error 50 times (closed each one with a click on the "ok" button) then the program crashed.

Installed on Windows 7/64.The program opens with "album" and freezes imeadiatly. Deinstalled with REVO (increadible that the included deistallers never know, where the programs are registered ;-( ). New start, new installation, same behaviour.
That's it.

I have Photoscape (Free) on my system and also Lightroom.

Having read the comments so far concluded that this is probably a 'personal choice' judgement so decided to test it for myself. Slow response & jerky. Very hit & miss with the 'Developing' sliders - not smooth. Not easy or indeed, natural to use and it doesn't have a pro feel about it. The animations are nice tho.

Against Photoscape this fails. It is a much more intuitive offering.

But I do urge anyone to try this as it just might fit in with your normal MO, but sadly, it doesn't, mine.

Thanks anyway GAOTD.

As a professional photographer, I know this program and it’s the best and excellent alternative to other professional photo programs!
Big thanks from me to the GOTD!

I specially tried the masking (it called matting in the program) functions, I find why it worth $79, just compare to other masking tool the quality and the price, if you ever installed one.

A selection wizard or selection brush would be a big help since mamy objects (human, animal, plant) are not convenient to select using a polygon, circle, or rectangle. Otherwise, very spiffy and fast. Excellent so far.

Looks like a very handy program, but not very intuitive. It's a keeper for me however I need to dive more deep into it.

Installed and crashed. Reinstall but not help
Windows 8 Pro 64bit

Facepalm...