Buying Photoshop

Brigid (sorry, spelled it wrong at first!) over at Home On the Range is asking her readers to help her decide if she should buy Photoshop, or not, to play around with.  I put my two cents in the comments, but this really deserves a full post.

First off is the financial considerations.  Photoshop is EXPENSIVE.  Even with the student discount it cost me $200, last I checked the full version was something like $800 or $1000 and I doubt its gone down much.  Thats alot of money to put into a piece of software that may not be what you want.  Now, Photoshop Elements is cheaper, but doesn’t have all the fancy smancy features of the newer Photoshops, but even better are some of the free tools out there.

I know there are more less expensive sets availible, I’ve not much, if any, experience with most of them so I’ll let you do your own research, but one online freeware I have used is the Aviary set.  The basics are free, though there is a subscription plan that I’ve never looked into.  The photo editor has the large majority of the same tools as Photoshop for free, that you can plan around with and figure out if this is something you enjoy or not.  After all it would really be annoying to spend all that money on Photoshop and then realize you don’t really enjoy working with it.

Something else to consider is just what exactly do you want to DO with this software:

If all you want to do is enhance your photos you may not NEED all the fancy stuff in Photoshop.  Take a closer look at Aviary and some of the other less expensive softwares out there and you’ll likely find they’re all you need.

If you want to create ART out of your photos, well then maybe Photoshop is for you, but I still highly recommend playing around with the above mentioned other softwares first.  For those of you who are wondering what I mean by “art” go HERE and browse for a bit, my current favorites are images one and two HERE.  The things people can do with some skill, effort, and way to much time on their hands!

A third thing you may be considering doing is drawing, sketching, or creating art by hand using these softwares, and in this case Photoshop is probly NOT right for you.  Oh, it’ll do it, sorta, but thats not what its designed for.  Take a look at software such as Corel’s Painter suite.  Much more designed for the artist in mind.  You can modify photos with these softwares, but they’re designed for drawing instead.

If you’re asking what I use, well, I have both Photoshop CS4 and Corel Painter 11 and I use them both.  As for what I do with them:

This photo was originially just of the barn.  I painted the fairy on it using a combination of Photoshop and Painter.  This image won Jurors Pick on Worth1000 (In a beginners contest).

This was a normal rose, till I started playing around in Photoshop.

This horse was done in Painter


Here’s a before and after (done in Photoshop) of a photo I posted previously of the puppy.  Can you tell the difference?

last but not least, a water color “painting” done in the originial version of Painter (before Corel bought it).


Soap and stuff

So lets see, I’ve used the samples of the Peppermint Foot Butter, and the Yuzu Body Butter, the Vanilla Solid Lotion, and opened the bar Beer soap. 

Now I’ve never used body butters before, usually stick with lotion, so I was surprised with how greasy they were at first, but it soaked in very quickly, and a little research tells me thats normal for body butters.  LOVED the pepermint one, but the Yuzu was a bit to citrisy for my taste.  It would be fine if you’d don’t mind citrus, but it was a bit much for me, though the scent faded quickly enough that it wasn’t the end of the world.  I will be getting more peppermint though next time I order, my feet are going to love me next winter!

The vanilla solid lotion has a bit of bite to its scent, not bad, just a bit startling at first, but it goes on nicely (for solid lotions, you warm them up for a few seconds in your hands, then rub on the area you want covered).  The puppy thought so too as he was determinedly licking it off my elbows as I was trying to rub it in.  It doesn’t leave much of a residue on the skin afterwards which was nice (I didn’t feel the need to wash my hands afterwards before I touched anything like I do with some lotions).

The beer soap is, as advertised, free of scent.  Which doesn’t mean it doesn’t smell, just that it smells like fresh clean soap (and not those fake “clean fresh” scents that you get in your laundry detergent).  Its not drying out my skin, but is doing a good job and keeping me clean.  Always nice.

As already stated I tried the Vanilla Lip Balm pretty much as soon as I opened the box, and I quite enjoy it, I think the only change I’m going to suggest to her is to add some mild SPF protection to the mix, as I prefer my lip balms contain such after having had sunburned lips as a kid (so not cool, let me tell you!).

The coffee soap, as I mentioned before, isn’t available on her website.  Its one of her original recipes, and easily the best thing I’ve ever run across for removing odor and residue off skin without excessive drying (though the beer soap is doing a good job at that too, so we’ll see).  Its not scented, and is the chocolate brown of lightly creamed coffee.  When I asked if I could get some for this order (since its not on the website) she admitted that she had lots around the house, as her family agrees with me, and she’s not allowed to run out.  She’s trying to reformulate it with a different oil so she can sell it on the website, but the lard appears to be a significant part of what makes this soap work so well and so hasn’t had any luck.

The Pink Sage soap sample has been placed in the 2nd bathroom by the litter boxes.  Its doing a very good job of neutralizing their odor, and the litter box odor is doing a very good job of neutralizing the very strong scent of the soap.  My intention is to let it air out for a few weeks and then see if I can tolerate it enough to give a review on it, as it is its just to strong for me to spend significant time around (but then I’m sensitive to scents, your mileage may vary).

If you decide to place an order and want to try a bar of the coffee soap don’t be afraid to ask her, just tell her Ruth sent you though or she’ll be going nuts trying to figure out how you found out about it!


Apollo is half his adult weight

Thursday morning he weighed in at 68lbs even, at 6 months of age. This puts him on schedule to meet or even beat his daddy’s 135lbs. One of his litter mates is gonna be a giant though, a month ago Aslan weighed in at 80lbs. Still in perfect proportion to his brother, he’s not a chubby puppy, just big!