Adobe Photoshop Elements & Premiere Elements 8
Adobe has released the latest version of Photoshop and Premiere Elements that is supposed to be a user friendly editor for photos and video but you may want to read further before looking at a purchase.
Ease of Use, Performance: 10/25
Look & Feel: 10/25
Features 20/25
How much I enjoy 10/25
Total: 50/100
Photoshop Elements 8 is a fine program and is the shining star in this package but Premiere Elements 8 is a fifty-fifty chance at best. It would seem it either works for people or it doesn’t but before I jump on my soap box or band wagon I’ll tackle the better part of this package deal and get to the tough stuff later.
Adobe Photoshop Elements 8 works and works well for an easy to use editor that will not only do things for you easily and quickly but will do things professionals do on images. Cropping and editing a picture to clear up imperfections in portraits and creating those professional looking pictures are at your fingertips.
The editor will start with an organizer but you can quickly get past this and to your editing when you want but the organizer is a nice way to find and organize your images and videos. While I have looked at many of the reviews of both Photoshop Elements 8 as well as the previous version I have not used a previous edition since version 5.
According to many of the reviews version 8 is only one new feature and several fixes beyond version 7 with the new feature being the Recompose Photo Tool. The Recompose Tool is a handy feature and one of those tools much like some of the previous new tools created by Adobe that is unique and a really worthwhile one.
The Recompose Tool adjusts an entire photo to get rid of one part of the image and resize the entire image without messing up the rest of the picture. As an example you can take the middle object or person out of three in a scene and fix the photo’s background and foreground.
Both the main background and rest of the scene will be edited and depending on the scene you can have good luck or just terrible editing with this tool. The terrible editing would be for scenes where the background or foreground differs a lot and would not clone well to get it to morph together.
The tool removes the image or section you want and morph the ends or parts to create a whole image with the part you want taken out. It works well and is limited to each pictures’ individual features so the tool works well for some pictures and not so good for others but overall is a great new feature.
I have used this tool on a couple of other programs as well as Photoshop Elements and it works very well, is easy to use and fits well with the Clone tool for massive editing on images. This is the type of tool that amateurs can use to create professional results on your own and emphasizes the unique editing power of the Elements set.
Other than this new tool the usual set of color, brightness and adjustment tools and editing tools like crop, clone and all kinds of others allow you to edit and change images with a professional touch. When my son graduated high school my wife took his pictures at several local spots and used Photoshop Elements 5 to edit them for a professional look.
We have given away several of the pictures and had many comments on the professional look, several even asked which local photographer did his graduation photos. Photoshop Elements 8 is the same set of tools and professional quality editing features that make Adobe Photoshop and Elements the industry leader.
Photoshop Elements 8 is a great tool for image editing but if you have the previous edition you will probably want to skip this one as it really does not contain anything more than the Recompose Tool. If you really want this tool than an upgrade would be in order or if you have not purchased a previous version this is a great image editing tool and easy to use for the amateur.
While I did receive the Photoshop Elements 8 and Premiere Elements 8 package I cannot advise purchasing this as a set or even bothering with the Premiere Elements 8 single version. Premiere Elements 8 is broken and I could not really guarantee that it would work for you and I don’t think Adobe could either, sorry to say that but I thinks it’s true.
I know this is a bold statement but Adobe seems to have dropped the ball or released Premiere Elements 8 before it was ready and I know a lot of people have gotten it to work. A lot of other people are having problems with the basic program of Premiere Elements 8 before they even try to edit a video or connect a camcorder to the computer.
Some comments that led me to believe that others were having problems before I got much into the program are “not ready for primetime” and “Premiere Elements 8 has serious problems”. The program works for me for standard definition videos from a low budget camcorder but not from a more expensive camcorder shooting high definition.
After much troubleshooting and help from Adobe support as well as the product manager of Premiere Elements 8 I was informed that the video file that my camcorder uses is not supported by the program. While the system requirements for the program only specify that file types like AVI and H.264 are supported these can vary according to manufacturers of camcorders.
I understand that the program designers can only test and try out so many camcorders before releasing the program but so many other users are also having problems before using any camcorder. The problem here is that so many others are also having serious problems with Premiere Elements 8 and not just novice users so I am not the only one with concerns.
I started a thread on the Adobe forums and found out that many people are having problems with running the program and editing both standard and high definition video. Others have had no problems with it and can successfully edit and burn videos to both DVD and Blu-ray discs but the amount of people with problems is disturbing.
I think looking at forums and sites that sell the program gives a clear indication that this truly is the edition that was released before it was ready. Amazon has two really good indications of the programs problems with 34 customer reviews and 14 of them rating the Premiere Elements 8 and Photoshop Elements 8 package a 1 star out of 5.
Even more to the point the Premiere Elements 8 single program has 56 customer reviews with an overwhelming 35 reviews rated at 1 star out of 5. This really indicates the Premiere Elements program is having serious customer problems and I just cannot recommend it and not be worried about people wasting their money on it.
“The upgrade that never was” and “money wasted” are first comments viewed but many others also show that customers are mad and have not gotten much satisfaction out of this program. Obviously many people are having problems so the program is being used on various computers and with different camcorders so the program would be the only thing common among so many users.
I have also heard from several people that have top systems, new Intel Core i7 processors with plenty of memory and disk space that get other Adobe programs to work just fine and cannot get Premiere Elements 8 to work at all or slowly and with problems. Several users are professionals in video and image editing and have used other Adobe products for years and just cannot get the program to work as well as advertised.
I have contacted the support team as well as the product manager and am not convinced that any problems are with my system or even my camcorder but the program in general. Adobe Premiere Elements 8 does do a good job of editing video, creating complete home movies from videos quickly and easily when it does work.
But when it doesn’t work white screens, totally non responsive and very slow computer response are typical as well as having to shut down Premiere Elements 8 using Task Manager or restarting the computer. Problems are so bad with shutting down the program and making sure it has closed completely that someone has created a small program to ensure all the programs processes have closed after you shut it down.
The program seems to have a lot of people on both sides of the issue with those using it and others who are so mad they are throwing it away and looking elsewhere for their video editing needs. There are also a lot of people supporting Adobe and wanting to see them make good on their advertising promises of an easy to use video editing program.
I would also like to see this as a good program as I have been quite happy with previous Adobe products but I do want to be honest and fair in my review. Premiere Elements 8 is just not going to work as well as Adobe had hoped and patching it is not going to instill trust in its use for many.
Adobe’s Photoshop Elements 8 is a great program and well worth the cost for a simple to use image editor that works great but I would get the single package if you’re going to purchase this image editor. If you have a recent release of Photoshop Elements such as version 7 the upgrade may not be worthwhile as many have said not much has changed since the previous version with the only additional feature being the Recompose Tool.
Photoshop Elements 8 would be a great image editor for a first time purchase for anyone looking for an image editor that is simple to use but can also do those professional looking edits with some work. The Premiere Elements 8 video editing program is not worth the cost because you cannot be sure it will work as many with very good systems and camcorders could not get it to work.
Premiere Elements 8 is just not worth considering for a purchase even if Adobe gets many things fixed as I just would not trust the basic program. Too much is riding on being able to patch a program that may not be right in the first place and patches may not be the answer.
I am not sure if anything would be able to solve this situation other than an apology or admission that something is wrong and the program needs a complete overhaul in the next version. I would seriously consider any other video editing program such as Cyberlink PowerDirector or Corel’s Digital Studio 2010 for video editing.
Adobe Premiere Elements 8 is just broken for too many people and the reason I would not consider a purchase of it for anyone, my rating of 50/100 is based on Premiere Elements not being worth a purchase.