I am a longtime user of Corel products, at the same time, I am a longtime user of their competitor’s products. And in the past few years, with computer upgrades (and finding out software I purchased can no longer be installed) and major changes on pricing structure of the competitor, I have begun looking at Corel products much more, as you can still purchase physical media, which I do like and also a one time cost, until the next upgrade or adding more software if one decides to do so.
So, I decided to give Corel’s PaintShop Pro 2020 Ultimate a shot!
It’s important to note that the software is for PC and not for MAC.
PaintShop Pro 2020 Ultimate comes with the 32-bit and 64-bit version of the program and also includes Particle Shop, Corel Studio, Parallels Toolbox, PhotoMirage Express, Painter Essentials 6, Corel Aftershot 3 and Creative Collection.
I began with the primary product PaintShop Pro 2020, in which it is recommended to install both versions what I did. And while my last foray into PaintShop Pro products were during the X2 era, I have to say that I really like PaintShop Pro 2020 Ultimate and what it offers for beginners, intermediate and advance users.
When you start, click on “Get Started” and you will have three choices of Workspaces: Photography, Essentials and Complete.
It’s important to note that PaintShop Pro 2020 works with RAW files and I was able to open my RAWS from my Canon DSLR, Panasonic Lumix and also even a FUJI FILM .RAF file with no problems.
For those who don’t want anything too complex and are working with photos, then definitely start with Photography first.
On Corel PaintShop Pro 2020 Ultimate, it makes things easier for those who just want to click on a preset. For example, I used one of the photos that I had that was taken for test and not meant to be used for a final product, but I was testing lighting. But I wanted to see how things worked with the presets.
The software uses many presets from portrait to landscape and once you click on a preset, you can do further tweaks by removing noise, adjusting lighting and such. And of course, cropping.
This is good to do a lot of experimenting to see which works for you. I’ve noticed a few effects from the ’90s that are still featured on there but I can see why as certain smaller advertising companies still love their “page curl”.
But overall, I was quite pleased to see how the PaintShop Pro 2020 Photography Workspace was utilized and makes it real easy for photographers who don’t want to mess around with software and aren’t technical. A click on a preset, slight tweaks and you’re done.
And here is a quick less than five minute tweak and aside from the chromatic aberration in the arm areas (which I can fix up), I do like how things adjusted with the multiple tweaks.
The next thing was to try Essentials and it’s pretty much Corel PaintShop Pro without the layering but wants to use the selection tools. Once again, I did a few quick tweaks with colors and such of this landscape featuring Mt. Fuji during the cold winter which was a wee bit on the greenish side and here is the result.
Now, as a person who has utilized layering and more advanced adjustment of photos, here is what the layout of the Complete Version looks compared to the Essentials. You have more at your disposal to really go out and modify and adjust your photo, especially for more advanced duties.
For example, for real estate companies, they can take a picture of a home during the winter but the photo is used for many months and of course, during the winter, I have been asked if I can make yellow grass green and dead plants look alive from a previous photo and that is where I need to do a bit more tweaking.
Sometimes a photo taken was not in the best lighting situations and a photo needs tweaking for a publication.
So, complete gives designers a bit more flexibility. An example of really tweaking a photo is a photo of cherry blossoms at Inokashira Park. The photo was a bit dark, the cherry blossoms looked more white than pink and I wanted to showcase pink versus white. I wanted colors to be vibrant, skies to be more blue and so working on the photo, here is how it turned out:
Granted, when you do a lot of tweaks, you can run into creating unneeded artifacts and other issues in your photo, but I found that Corel PaintShop Pro 2020 Ultimate did a good job in helping me fix those issues.
I’m only touching upon a few things that the software can offer but I will say that I’ve had no slowdown issues, I have had no crashing issues. The software has run quickly and I actually did a test with numerous Office products, multiple browsers, even with multiple Corel software open and with my Intel Core i7-8750H 2.21 GHz with 16.0 GB of ram on Windows 10.
Next up, I tried the other included software and I’m only going to touch on these a little. But first, I just want to say that I hope Corel considers selling their Ultimate or other larger software sets with USB versus a DVD-Rom. As many computers are not coming equipped with a DVD player these days and one having to purchase an external, it really does help to run the software on USB.
If there is one issue that I had, it was installing the software. I had to constantly check why things weren’t installing and wondering if my DVD player’s lens was dirty, if the disc had fingerprint smudges. And things were chugging along for these other software to install.
I had to do a cleaning and then everything worked perfectly with installation. Others who have the issue, I can’t say if it’s a dirty lens but in my case, I had to do a cleaning of my drive and disc to make things work.
Nevertheless, I hope Corel does consider selling their software sets on USB versus DVD.
OK, now for the other software. Each software comes with their own serial #.
AfterShot 3 Standard is included and with that being said, having used AfterShot Pro for the past few years, AfterShot 3 is a very good product for photographers who want to import and work on their RAW photos and organize them. You can also tweak photos in their, but you can do the same with PaintShop Pro. And the way that PaintShop Pro 2020 Ultimate is designed, especially with their Workspaces: Photography, Essentials and Complete and ability to work with RAW and HDR photos, is there even a need for AfterShot Pro any longer? Some may yes, others may say no. But I do believe that with PaintShop Pro 2000 Ultimate having that photography workspace, I can see many photographers usings Corel products feeling that PaintShop Pro 2000 is more than enough for their needs.
Nevertheless, the addition to this Ultimate software package is a plus!
The next is Painter Essentials 6, a slim down version of their popular Painter software which allows you to use multiple brushes, various papers, various paint to pencils to paint or create art digitally but also to turn your photos into a painting. I have been a user of Corel Painter since Corel Painter 8 (back in 2002) and I like how fast things generate to show you a painted rendition. Above is “Detailed Painting”, the bottom is an impressionist painting using dry bristle brushes.
And I was thrilled to see how much the essentials was able to accomplish, because I figured Corel would strip it down even more in order to get people to by the full product. But once again, another major plus to this Ultimate package.
Next up is Photo Mirage Express. This allows one to put movement into images. You can add movements, then mask the areas you want to stay in place, but it’s pretty cool and another welcomed addition to the PaintShop Pro 2020 Ultimate.
Next up are effects filters: Particle Shop (which is very limited to a core pack and you have to pay to get more particle effects) and GRFX Studio (which actually gives you a bit more).
These can be used as individual programs and also be used with the competitor’s product as a filter and this is for those who want to add effects to their photos. May it be particle effects, flames, fog or even color changes.
Here is an example of my “Gothic Lolita Lan” 3D artwork:
Adding the fog effect to the edges, making sure the face is more pronounced and then bringing it into Corel PaintShop Pro 2020 to do a bit more tweaking.
While these effects are limited and you can purchase more, considering I had to do my own effects from scratch and have many dozens of layers just to get things done, was quite time consuming. But it does help to have these filters these days that can accomplish certain things and then being able to tweak it. That’s pretty cool!
And last, you get Parallels Toolbox and get a Promo Code which allows you to use the Mac OS on Windows. You get 12 months free and then you get billed a yearly fee for $19 and it does require a credit card or Paypal to get started. I didn’t try this out.
Overall, “PaintShop Pro 2020 Ultimate” is probably the best version of “PaintShop Pro” I have used in my many years of utilizing the software.
There was no doubt a lot of thought that went into the product of how to reach to beginners, intermediate and advance users, may they be designers, photographers and those looking for an alternative to the other major competitor.
I have had my share of personal quirks with Corel design software since the early ’90s and even a few years ago. But this time around, I feel Corel has a hit grand slam and has created the definitive software of their product. And the fact that it’s physical release and offered for a very reasonable price, Corel’s “Paintshop Pro 2020 Ultimate” gets a five star review!
Highly recommended!
