help please

Get in a rush.
512 is barely enough to run os x
I upgraded my 13' macbook to 2 gigs the same week I got it (took a day or two to find the right chips) but it had crashed when using photosop several times before the upgrade and never since.

I fully intend to go up to 2 Gb ram, but I can't afford it since I've spent out on a camera.

It's only photolab that has ever crashed on this computer, everything else runs fine.

Wise to live within your means always.

but believe me, some programs hog ram, and osx sets aside dedicated slots of ram for each program you open, so even the order in which you open the programs can affect how much ram the program gets. some programs will freeze or crash if they don't get what they need.

Your hard drive will live alot longer, with more ram as it gets aceeseed and put to use as virtual ram when the system gets taxed by a ram hungry program.

Photoshop, and other image/video editing programs will scream when you get the ram and an external hd (for content/scratchdisks).

Have you tried GraphicConverter for the Mac ?

http://www.lemkesoft.com/

I've been using it for a few years now, and it open loads of picture formats
and lets you save in loads of formats, even opens .pef's from my DS.
It's free to try and cost $30 to keep. The most recent versions have just
about everythying you need for Digital Manipulation.
If you use it for RAW, remember the RAW files are quite big, and as Don
says, it will be slow processing the effects you want, if you don't have
loads of RAM

I'll take a look, thanks.

Just to clarify the point, Photoshop is the industry standard and as a consequence is pretty much an essential for many people.

Personally I could use any one of a number of programs, but I like Photoshop and actually have a bit of a preference for Photoshop 7.

So if I happen to say "Photoshop" you can happily substitute any alternative that suits what you want to do.

Now where did I put the Hoover....

Hi all

I have a few questions maybe some of you folk can answer

1. On the edited image done in silky pix done by Matt i have noticed strong purple and green friges around the trees it is also there on the un edited images but not as strong. This is only really noticable when view viewing full size which leads me to my next question.

2. I tend to print no bigger than A4 hopefully i will be printing A3 soon. What is the actual size of a 10mp image compared to A4, what i mean is it roughly A4 x 4 or 5 etc..etc.. And if i printed or had a printer capable of printing its maximum size i would be worried about the quality. For example when i view any image at full size on my screen it really does not look clear at all almost blurred rather like pixelation when zooming to much on an image.

3. Is all this normal as im still learning ?? perhaps someone can explain

Thanks Pete

Pete, your monitor displays at something like 72ppi (pixels per inch)

The K10D produces files which are of the order 3800x2533 pixels (I know that isn't quite right, I don't have a photo to hand atm, but 72ppi for monitor resolution is also a pretty dodgy guestimate so it really doesn't matter)

So if you were to print your full frame photo from a K10D at 100% on paper, you'd end up with a print something like 52x35 inches.

thats pretty big, probably 2 normal posters side by side.

now get up really close to a "real" poster, and scrutinise the resolution. You'll see that it really isn't that great, because a picture this size is just not supposed to be viewed up close and personal.

It's Chromatic Aberration (CA). I should've tweaked it out in SPDS3, but didn't have time
(Do a search - I've already commented a lot on CA, regarding one of spirit_of_will's shots).
Matt

The K10D produces images 3872 x 2592 pixels.

At 72ppi (screen resolution) that image is 136.6 x 91.44 cm

With no interpolation (upsizing or downsizing) at 300ppi (printing resolution) you would have a print of 32.78 x 21.95cm (12.904 x 8.64 inches) which is slightly larger than A4.

However, Photoshop is perfectly capable of interpolating that image to larger sizes and prints of A3 or larger are no problem whatsoever.

If you do have access to Photoshop, then the Image>Image Size dialog box will enable you to play around with all these values and see for yourself what the effect is.

If it's any consolation aj, I too am climbing the steep K10D learning curve and also have had Photo Lab crash my pc - specifically when setting grey point. However, what crashes a computer can be elusive: Elements 4 is not supposed to run at all on my AMD dual processor, Adobe specify Intel, but it does (my scanner seems to have been zapped though), but my DVD burning s/w stopped working until I realised that Internet Explorer 7 had crept onto the pc - I use Firefox - and zapping IE7 solved the problem.

Matt has been helpful to me re RAW processing (thanks Matt) and I am gradually coming to terms with turning the raw material of the RAW file (can't be the first with that pun surely) into a passable image. The camera is very capable but it takes some driving.

Keep going. It's worth it.

Stuart[/img]