Photo Explosion Deluxe Review

Ease of Use, Rated 4.5
Photo Explosion is made with the home user in mind. Overall, it’s set up with the right idea but some of the details make it hard to use. The major functions are broken down into the major tasks of importing, editing, printing, sharing, and web. Each section has separate tabbed options. Once you drill down, however, the functions become tedious. You have to go through several steps to accomplish the task.

Importing, Rated 4
With Photo Explosion you can import photos directly from a digital camera, scanner or video capture. Unfortunately, you cannot import photos directly from a removable device like a SmartCard often used in digital cameras. Instead, you have to manually open them.

Output, Rated 4
Photo Explosion Deluxe supports 12 of the most common file formats. This should be enough for the average user. If you need to upload images for web pages though, you should probably find a better program like Adobe Photoshop Elements 3 that lets you see a preview of the different compression settings before you save it.

Editing, Rated 3
Photo Explosion Deluxe comes with most of the features to fix common problems in photos. You can straighten, crop, adjust the brightness and contrast, adjust the hue (color) and saturation, focus, and remove red-eye. There is a “SmartEnhance” feature that will automatically adjust the lighting, color, or focus according to what it thinks best. Or, you can adjust them manually by selecting from several thumbnails. To remove the red-eye you just select a brush size and click on the red part of the eye. You can also change the eye color.

Layers in this program are simply built-in objects, text or multiple photos that you can click on and move around and edit independently of the other objects. You can change the opacity of each object but you cannot put a gradient transparency to merge the two together. There is a separate application that comes with Photo Explosion Deluxe that will merge multiple photos at the seams to create a panorama. I found it difficult to select the object I wanted when there were multiple objects.

The text tool is easy to use but very basic. Instead of being able to just type on an image and see in real time how it looks, you first have to type the text in a separate box on the left and click Apply. There are simple formatting options (bold, italic, underline, color) and you can add a texture or a gradient to the text from a list of options. You can also go back and edit the text at any time.

The selection tools include a simple shape tool, lasso tool and a magic wand. The magic wand tool will select a section of an image with the same range of colors. This is useful when you have a simple background you want to cut out.

You can use batches to enhance, rotate, or convert to different file formats. In this case, a batch is simply a preset action (e.g. rotate 90 degrees clockwise) that you can apply to multiple photos at the same time. You cannot record your own sequence of actions with Photo Explosion.

The undos are limited in this program so be careful that you don’t go too far before you can’t turn back.

Sharing, Rated 4.5
Photo Explosion deluxe offers several ways to share your photos. You can send it through email either as an attachment or as an html email. You can even pick from one of 3 preset sizes and quality settings. You can also optimize photos for cell phones, create wallpapers, make a calendar using templates, and create a web gallery from several templates. There are also several different printing layouts to choose from.  Using a separate application that comes with Photo Explosion Deluxe, you can make photo slideshows that you can burn to a CD and play in a VCD-compatible DVD player. This separate application is very cumbersome and not easy to use. It only uses .jpg image files and .mp3 or .wav music file formats.

Support, Rated 4
Photo Explosion comes with a User Manual and integrated help. The Help has detailed steps and instructions but no screenshots. It’s very easy to get to the help and other resources through the program. There is a short list of FAQs on the website that you can reference as well. You can also contact a tech support rep through an online form.

Summary
This program is a good option if you have a tighter budget, don’t need any bells and whistles, like the templates, or only have a few photos to edit once in a while.

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