PhotoPlus Starter Edition Editor's Review

Serif’s PhotoPlus Starter Edition is the free, Microsoft Windows-based, proprietary image manipulation software with some powerful image enhancement functions. 

The product is based around its full-price sibling PhotoPlus which priced at £72 sits between Adobe Photoshop Elements and Corel PaintShop Pro. The Starter Edition, as a free product competes with GIMP, issued under the GNU license, but wins, hands-down, as its user interface is easier and friendlier. This raises the question about the usability of PhotoPlus SE; just how useful is the cut-down version of the full price product? 

The truth is the application is an solid image editor. Images can be imported and edited, straightened, cropped to common print sizes; old and damaged photos can be repaired and unwanted objects can be removed from the image. 

As an entry level product it offers guidance via the ‘How to’ palette, help menu and some good tutorials. 

The image editor allows level, curve, brightness and contrast adjustment but blocks the other tools e.g. for colour balance. A red-eye removal tool is included. It has an Effects Menu which enables layer tools – drop shadows, bevelling and embossing are supported and a Brush-tip palette – which includes texture effects and artistic brushes. The filter gallery offers a number of filters to apply to images. 

Pros: Filter gallery and artistic effects. 

Cons: Disabled features not clearly indicated; non-destructive editing is not automatic; exporting images with multiple layers can be slow.

Conclusion: This is a useful tool for basic image editing and the creation of complete graphics, such as a poster or an advert. PhotoPlus SE may attract users who go on to upgrade. It lacks the comprehensiveness of the full product, but we commend it to beginners as it is very usable.