AKVIS ArtSuite v. 10 - review

AKVIS ArtSuite is an impressing collection of versatile effects for decorating photos. You may need it on many occasions: when creating a postcard for your friends, making a holiday album, a personalized desktop wallpaper, or just playing with your images "for art's sake".AKVIS ArtSuite offers several basic effects that allow creating an endless number of effect versions.
The software is ease to use and to learn, and has a simple and intuitive interface. The program's window displays Before and After images for comparison. You can switch between them with a click on the image.The Hints panel shows the description of the parameters and buttons when you hover over them with the cursor.The software lets you save your favorite settings (with a texture pattern) as a preset (into a file .arts) and use them in the future. AKVIS ArtSuite is available in two versions – as a standalone program and as plug-in to a photo editor. The plug-in version is compatible with Adobe Photoshop, Photoshop Elements, Corel Paint Shop Pro, etc. Refer to Check the compatibility page for more details. The comparison of versions is here: http://akvis.com/en/artsuite/comparison.php.
The effects are grouped as Frames and Effects.
Frames:
Photo frames (edge effects) let you generate a photo frame for your photo. Add elegance and style to your image by putting it into a classic frame with wood carving or create a funny picture by adding some cheerful frogs. The frames samples that come with ArtSuite can be easily tailored to your particular photo. Select a color for the frame; choose its form, its style, brightness, and the intensity of the applied edge effect. You can create a frame with ragged edges, scratched surface, a page curl, etc. It can be a wooden frame with figured carving or a frame with an ornament. If you enjoy working with layers, you will appreciate the possibility to apply a transparent frame, so that the lower layer(s) could serve as a background.
Effects
Artistic effects allow experimenting with photos – convert a photo into a B&W image and consequently add a color shade to it (for example, a sepia effect); replace colors on an image, add a texture (chosen from the built-in Texture Library or one created by the user) so that the image looks like drawn on a canvas, brick wall, corrugated paper, turn a photo into a halftone picture giving it a retro comic book look, etc. Screenshots are here: http://akvis.com/en/artsuite/screenshots-artistic-effects.php
Large set of exaamples is here: http://akvis.com/en/artsuite/examples-artistic-effects.php
You will find more information about ArtSuite v. 10 here: 
http://akvis.com/en/artsuite/index.php

Perfect Photo Suite 8 - review

Perfect Photo Suite 8 from http://www.ononesoftware.com/ is a result of your ideas and feedback and includes more ways to create the images you want, the way you want. Now it’s even faster and easier to spark your inspiration, fix your photos, and create your perfect image—all in this one powerful and complete photo editing solution. Work the way you want and perform editing tasks that are too time-consuming in Adobe® Photoshop®, or impossible to do alone in Lightroom®, Photoshop Elements, or Apple® Aperture®. You'll have all that you need to enhance, retouch and stylize images, replace backgrounds, and create high quality enlargements.
Overview
- Filters That Make Your Images Look Their Best
Create any effect you want with 23 filters that you can adjust, combine, stack and blend.
- Dynamic Contrast Filter Adds Stunning Clarity
Make your images pop without sacrificing highlight or shadow detail, or creating halos.
- Perfect Mask Expertly Removes Backgrounds
Mask Pro technology makes selecting subjects and isolating backgrounds surprisingly easy.
- Perfect Eraser with Content Aware Filter Technology
Seamlessly remove objects and automatically reconstruct your background with a simple swipe.
- Add Realistic Lens Blur After the Shot
Choose your focal point and easily create blur effects, such as tilt-shift or a shallow depth of field.
- Perfect Portrait Makes Faces Flawless & Natural
Improve skin texture, remove blemishes, and enhance facial features with automated tools.
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What is new in version 8
- Perfect Enhance Module
Make basic corrections that almost every image needs to go from good to great. Get automatic fixes or fine-tune your brightness, contrast, vibrancy, detail, and more.
- Perfect Eraser
Using content-aware fill technology, remove objects and automatically reconstruct what could have been behind it with the powerful Perfect Eraser.
- Adjustable Filters
Enjoy over 20 adjustable Filters in the Effects module that give you the power to create any effect you want—from the popular HDR look to a vintage, Instagram®-inspired look. Add stunning dynamic contrast to your images, a sunshine glow, texture overlay, a bokeh effect after the shot, and more!
- Customizable Presets
You now have the power to fine-tune every preset included in the Suite. Settings are now revealed so you can dial in the exact look you want—and save them as your own preset to use over and over again with any image.
- FocalPoint is Now in the Effects Module
The best parts of our FocalPoint technology are now in the Effects module as the Lens Blur filter. Add selective focus, a cool miniature tilt-shift effect, or bokeh highlights to your photos as a seamless part of your creative stylization workflow.
- New Browser
Quickly get to your images wherever they're stored—on your computer, your network, or on a cloud-based storage service like Dropbox, Google Drive, or Apple's Photo Stream.
- Time-saving Batch Processing
Automatically repeat your editing actions across multiple images from any one module or string actions together from multiple modules. Get consistent results quickly as you batch process image resizing, stylization, cropping, and even adding a visual watermark to your entire group of selected images.
My own All-in-One Slideshow-review will be here soon.
The link to my All-in-One Slideshow-review will be published here!