Digital Photographer's Software Guide - Bertemes - Net

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The Digital Photographer's Software Guide
on a collection long after the pictures have been archived. A well-managed photo studio
should not wait for the DAM “ingestion” treatment but should make the image
collection searchable at an early stage. It saves a lot of time and effort later and may even
yield some short-term commercial benefits.
Cataloging the different cataloging products is not easy, as you can see by the absence
of Photo Mechanic (see Chapter 2, “Image Viewers”). Another product that has been
difficult to classify is ACDSee Pro, which is renowned for its cataloging abilities but has
grown to become a complete workflow solution. It seems more at home here, if a little
big for the nest, rather than in a category by itself.
ACDSee Pro Photo Manager
Vendor: ACD Systems
Purpose: End-to-end workflow solution for digital photographers
Description
ACDSee Pro Photo Manager is a “complete solution” for digital photography, allowing
users to view, process, edit, organize, catalog, publish, and archive photo collections.
Well established in the market, having had input from many professional photographers
in the years since its launch, it offers comprehensive RAW support, fast processing of
large files, and efficient image handling and cataloging facilities. As an image editor it
is not a rival to Photoshop, but has many quick editing features and comes with full
color management support for ICC and ICM profiles.
Moderately priced, ACDSee Pro Photo Manager is worth the money for its image sorting
capabilities, which have always been its greatest strengths. Its features include visual
tagging, which allows you to find your pictures more quickly. Traditionally, its RAW
support has always been strong, and it now has integrated support for Adobe’s DNG
(Digital Negative specification). It provides full control over white balance, exposure,
sharpness, and noise.
ACDSee’s publishing facilities include PDF creation, slide show creation with audio, customized
Web galleries, email with auto-resizing, and high-quality contact sheet printing.
A less expensive edition, really a separate product, is the ACDSee 10 Image Manager,
aimed at “photo enthusiasts with a growing image collection.” See the vendor’s Website
for a full comparison.
Comments
Having so many features in a single package is undoubtedly an advantage, but it is
difficult to supply “best of breed” quality for every one of them. Despite its “pro” title,
ACDSee Pro Photo Manager has not quite kept up with the furious pace of development
in RAW processing, although its image sorting facilities remain among the best.