Criticism

[hocker]

I used to use Lightroom. Then I used IDI for many years, tried ADC went back to IDI and now I'm using PS. Even purchased it, thanks to the generous upgrade(?) offer by Hert et al.
But. I dislike two things.
One is the fact that I can't stop comparing PS to IDI, ADC even LR. I know Hert doesn't like this. However, whatever we buy is based on choice. I buy a product after comparing it with another. Enough said.
There are too many things not included with PS: and we have to ask for this, that and the other.

And this leads to the second thing I don't like.
It's Hert's baby. And like any proud father, you'd better not criticise.
I would agree: here's my product and here's my price.

But, Hert, if you don't want comparisons and criticism, then don't ask for them.
I think it's quite telling that what most people are requesting are basic functions, available in IDI and many other pieces of software out there.

I'm going back to Lightroom.

I'll keep upgrading PS while it's free to do so. If it improves in various areas, I might stick with it, but not yet.

(Update by Hert; changed the title from Byeee to Criticism)

[Hert]

Of course you're free to compare tools, like you also said...it would be strange if you wouldn't...it's only natural. And I don't know where your statement comes from to not criticize. Criticism is what made the products. But you're right...I don't like anyone bashing my children without providing valid reasons. And I don't like statements like "it needs to improve in various areas" without telling me what needs to improve and in what areas. Positive(!) criticism with the purpose of getting things changed is what is the source for development. And your statement "here's my product here's my price" doesn't hold. Then how would there ever be new releases. I'm not the one who thinks out all the thousands of improvements and additions that are built into the application. It's the users who requests additions, or changes or files bugs/issues.

When I read your post you're mainly criticizing me but not saying anything about PSU, not even what you don't like about PSU. PSU is indeed different and that's exactly why PSU is successful.

Did you give PSU some time to learn it? PSU is extremely feature rich, but it's all wrapped in a clean interface. If you're looking for features but can't find them then ask. Share your questions and constructive criticism about PSU. Log feature requests in a Mantis...become part of the community.

Also, Lightroom is not known to excel in its DAM capabilities. If LR is sufficient for your DAM needs then i think your DAM needs are quite limited...but maybe LR offers that one feature that PSU doesn't offer (?); in which case I'd be very interested to hear about.

[danaltick]

I purchase a Catalog Manager strictly for it's Asset Management capabilities. Everything else is really just icing as far as I'm concerned. PSU simply cannot be touched by any other product as a digital asset manager, and I must say Hert has truly brought it all together with version 2... better, stronger, faster.

Keep the updates comin'... I'm lovin' it!

BTW, sorry for the hiatus. Put the camera on the shelf for a while, but I've got the itch again .

Best-
Dan

[stevehughes]

+1

Is there really much that "the previous product" could do that PSU doesn't? As of Version 2 I'd suggest "not much". Yet PSU has managed to keep an attractive, simple, mostly intuitive interface and very good performance.

Even an old wishlist item of mine regarding 'cumulative redating' has just snuck into the feature set

Keep the good stuff coming.

Steve

[HaraldE]

Morning,

+0

I have some mixed feelings here and will try to walk carefully (;=))

For me PSU is one of my two most valuable tools in my daily work (the other one is SmugMug). I am happy with PSU. On the other hand I can easily make a list of things that I miss.
But saying that a function is not in PSU may not be a negative remark. Maybe the function should not be there or has not been implemented yet or similar.
Technically I would like to see improved documentation and an better overview of what fucntions there are or that is planned. Yes, yes, I know ... to much admin, but it doesn't stop me from wishing.

The other side of the coin is the dialog between users and developer(s). Also here we can benefit from some improvement. For example, earlier there was a forum called Chit-Chat (or similar) where any topic could be raised. This Forum was suddenly removed. I miss that Forum and would be happy to see it back ... with no limits to the topics, for example positive critisism and comparing tools and such

My final remark is to advice all to avoid all negative remarks. It is so much better to suggest a way forward by using positive critisism than stating a negative thing. And do not use personal negative remarks. After many years with international projects I leant how easy it is to make a misstake when writing.

If anyone feel pointed at with a negative finger above, then I appologise, this has not been my intention. But, if you get that feeling, step back a bit and think it over ... with a positive attitude.

Regards, Harald

[fbungarz]

Dear all,
Please do not take this the wrong way, but reading this:

Is there really much that "the previous product" could do that PSU doesn't? As of Version 2 I'd suggest "not much".

I agree that PSU v2 is a huge step forward and I love several aspects (I really do!): the new GPS panel is MUCH better, overall speed is MUCH better (though building thumbs from large TIFFs is MUCH slower!!!), PSU works a lot better with other tools (photoshop, lightrrom), the dynamic search is a huge improvement, now all branches of the tree expand quickly (metadata used to be a real drag...).

Still, I there are some aspects that I sorely miss:

Batch editing labels
Create custom XMP
Version Detection Wizard
Version Bar
Custom Print Templates
...

Yes, I admit, this is my personal collection...
And: Yes, I realize, leaving features out, which were considered "confusing" or "too complex" was intentional. The idea being to present a much simpler, much more streamlined interface for a wider audience, an audience simply overwhelmed and put-off by "the previous product". Still, the way it was dine alienated quite a few, including me. And nevertheless I also admit: I searched for alternatives and found none. Other products are either even more unwieldy or much too basic.

So, I do agree that PSU is powerful and probably the best tool still to databasing your images. That doesn't mean I am not allowed to dream, right?

And I really do hope nobody gets upset

Cheers,
Frank

[Hert]

Building thumbs for large TIFS can theoretically not be slower...it's the exact same code. Maybe you have an image processing limit set and if your Tif size is above that limit then Windows will build the thumb. Or you have a limit set in idi and windows is building the thumbs there (which could be faster), either way...if configured the same it can't be different in speed.

And of the things you name:
There is custom XMP (and now usable for everyone and not only those with a degree in XMP technology)
There is version detection (no wizard needed. It just works when you adopt the simple detection rules)
The version bar as the version representation changed to version tabs

Custom Print templates is for the software that specializes in printing which you can feed from within PSU. Batch editing labels may return some day when enough people expressed their need for it.

[fbungarz]

Hi Hert,

Building thumbs for large TIFS can theoretically not be slower...it's the exact same code.

Not sure what you mean. Building a thumb from a 120 MB TIFF (scanned 24 bit from slide film) takes about 2 minutes per image file.
NEFs, DNGs and JPGs are MUCH faster (few seconds), though I admit their file size is smaller too.

Smaller file size = faster, that should be obvious, though I would not expect the difference to be so extreme (seconds vs. minutes)
Yet, what I meant: PSU takes minutes to build thumbs from these TIFFs, IDI takes seconds. In PSU there is a huge difference between large TIFFs and all the other file formats, in IDI there is none (ore not noticable). OK, PSU builds larger thumbs, but I already selected the smallest thumb possible...

And of the things you name:
There is custom XMP (and now usable for everyone and not only those with a degree in XMP technology)

OK, I had not noticed you added this to PSU v2. That is fantastic news!!! Still, I cannot seem to find the XMP editor? How can I generate a new custom XMP schema? You say this is now usable for everyone, yet I somehow cannot find any buttons, menu items or shortcuts to access a custom schema XMP editor...
[And of course I am not talking about PSU's proprietary pseudo-custom XMP...]

There is version detection (no wizard needed. It just works when you adopt the simple detection rules)

The wizard detects versions across different folders and different drives and lets me specify exactly which files should be assigned to a particular version. Both is not possible with automatic versioning (and apart from developing a "mind-reader", I don't know how PSU would know which different folders to search for versions or which image to assign to a particular version placeholder; it would be really helpful to at least be able to specify parts of the file name like for example "*_print.jpg" for the print version or "_web.jpg" for the web version; currently assigning such versions is possible only manually via drag and drop, quite a drag..).

The version bar as the version representation changed to version tabs

Yes, I know all too well, unfortunately I find the tabs extremely difficult to use. There is virtually now way that I can see directly if a particular file has all the versions that it should have; I always have to switch the view to have the versions displayed side by side. When I do it for one file all the other thumbs are lost and I need to switch back and when I do it for several files the result is a complete mess. Hovering over the tab does not display all indicators for which a version exists, but only the one for the selected tab - again it means I have no idea, which particular versions are present in a a file that for example has three tabs. Is it the Main Version, a Digital Negative, and a Print Version. Or is it the Main Version, the Print Version and a Web Version. Without first hovering across each single, minute tab there is no way of knowing what the tabs actually correspond. When I figured out it is possible to design custom icons for the versions, I thought "fantastic". And I expected these icons to be displayed on the tabs. Instead the tabs only have numbers and one has no idea what the tabs stand for
All this could be remedied if there was at least a way how to immediately display all versions of one file side by side without the necessity to switch main view thus loosing all the other thumbs...
Ah, well, I guess I am just that old fossil who still uses versions. It probably means, if I switch to PSU, I better abandon my old concept of versions and forget about them. Seems to be the trend anyways just do them on the fly, whenever they are needed, just like Lightroom's approach to non-destructive editing. Still I don't find that very flexible. Currently I typically crop a particular area of the image as part of the editing to chose exactly how the photo should look like. Such cropping cannot be done on the fly... Hmmm...

Custom Print templates is for the software that specializes in printing which you can feed from within PSU

Unfortunately I can NOT use an external tool to print contact sheets that read custom XMP from the files and actually print that custom XMP as captions below the images!!!
OK, so it is just me again (who else uses custom XMP). But perhaps there are people who would some custom XMP on theri contact sheets?
Besides: that same argument was made when version 1 did not include a GPS panel. And with that same argument you could have removed all editing functionality from PSU - there are tons of tools out there that do a much better job editing images and one could just as easily argue PSU's strength is image management, nit editing. Thus editing should as well be removed!?

Batch editing labels may return some day when enough people expressed their need for it.

Glad to hear it

Hert - you say in response to the person who posted this:

...without telling me what needs to improve and in what areas. Positive(!) criticism with the purpose of getting things changed is what is the source for development...

Well, I do hope you take my points as just that: positive, constructive criticism.

Cheers,
Frank

[Hert]

You mention 24bits TIF and both PSU nor IDI support 24 bit TIF. 24 bit TIF is the most exotic bit format you can choose and is hardly supported by software out there and hardly used by anyone. I highly recommend to use either 8, 16 or 32 bit TIF files. Maybe you mean an 8 bit TIF with 3 channels?? I've tried a 528MB 8 bit sample here and the file loads in 1 second. Did you also check what I mentioned earlier...do you have an image processing limit set?

[fbungarz]

Hi Hert,
I am embarrassed. The files are 16 bit, not 24
They are only on my desktop, not the laptop from which I wrote this. I should have checked. I have actually experimented with your suggestion to turn on or off the option to load files beyond a certain size. You suggested that elsewhere. It makes no difference. Both is slow and almost seems to stall in PSU, fast and without a glitch in IDI.

I've tried a 528MB 8 bit sample here and the file loads in 1 second.

I am sure you have a top notch machine, right?

Part of the problem: I am using the older, slower desktop because I would like to know how large the database gets before I actually install PSU on the laptop (which I explained has a small SDD only). Since building the thumbs database is so slow and even stalls, I have no idea how large it will get. A bit of a bummer...

Ah, well...

Frank

[Hert]

I am sure you have a top notch machine, right?

That depends on what you call "top-notch". The fastest Windows machine that I have available, and which is used for development of the software is a 5 (or 6??) year old Sony Vaio Z laptop. It could easily be a museum piece

ThisPC.png (50.41 KiB) Viewed 8418 times

There are many many possible combinations. File size is hardly an issue when reading a TIF. What matters most is: what is the bit format, what is the color space, what is the compression used, what are the pixel dimensions.
Maybe you can send me one or two of *your* TIF files to see what the settings are used for the TIF and if I can reproduce it.

[fbungarz]

Hi Hert,
OK, will try to upload it from here, with the bad internet it will take ages though, might not work at all...
Thanks,
Frank