# What photo viewing application do you use?



## Garbz (Mar 27, 2008)

I'm on the search for a new photo viewing application and I am interested in what people here use?

I have for many years used ACDSee v3. Yes I know v10 is out but v3 was tiny, very light weight, viewed full screen, and changed images with a scroll wheel which is exactly what I needed. Except now I need an application that's colour managed.

Since ACDSee 10 has bloated to a full out image editing program and is still not fully colour managed I'm look for alternatives.


----------



## jols (Mar 27, 2008)

ha ha 

some of the stuff you said i dont know what your talking about, but i view my pics on picassa


----------



## Scurra (Mar 27, 2008)

I use Iview MediaPro3, because it offers a quick method of going through all my raw files.

But I also have a copy of lightroom kicking around somewhere that i'm trying to get to grips with.


----------



## Renair (Mar 27, 2008)

well i just use normal windows vista gallery  as all your doing is viewing them, you dont need anything fancy.


----------



## Big Mike (Mar 27, 2008)

I use Irfanview, it's a very lightweight program for viewing image.  It can recognize my RAW files and it has some pretty decent batch processing applications.  Best of all, it's free.


----------



## Atropine (Mar 27, 2008)

I check my raw files (cr2) directly in windows gallery (vista) and pick the ones I like and open them with Adobe Photoshop Camera Raw for further editing. It's simply the most streamlined way for me and it works perfect.


----------



## TCimages (Mar 27, 2008)

I use the DPP software that came with my Canon.  Works very well for my RAWs that at are stored on Networked Attached Storage.


----------



## mrodgers (Mar 27, 2008)

Irfanview again, or ThumbsPlus.  I use ThumbsPlus (for years) mostly when viewing.  I also use it for file organization on my pictures.  I use a base "sort" folder for copying from the camera to the computer, then view in ThumbsPlus to select and move them to individual categorized folders.


----------



## Garbz (Mar 27, 2008)

I'll have a look at Infranview, playing with ACDSee Pro2 now which is colour managed but I doubt worth it's insane pricetag.

Did check out thumbsplus which didn't meet my "easy full screen and scrolling" criteria, but the colour management did work well.

Vista Gallery and Windows picture and fax viewer both suffer from "microsoft being half assed" syndrome. They are "colour managed" as the website points out. Which is to say that they obey the colour space of the file so if you open an AdobeRGB file it'll display correctly, but they don't honour the output colour profile. Which means all photos look oversaturated red / green on my screen and any other screen that dares to be good enough to display a wider range of colours.


----------



## joecap (Mar 31, 2008)

I agree with Big Mike.
I have used Irfan View for years, there is nothing better for just viewing images.
It also does easy re-sizing, file conversions, some pretty hefty editing, and supports many Photoshop filters.


----------



## 68Whiskey (Mar 31, 2008)

I a actually use Dell Image Expert Premium. It is simple and I love it.

Here is a screenshot of what it looks like.
http://i240.photobucket.com/albums/ff250/68Whiskey/Forum Images/dellimgexpert.jpg


----------



## Garbz (Apr 1, 2008)

Bah just my luck. As appealing Irfan View sounds it lacks output colour management just like Windows picture viewer.


----------



## taracor (Apr 6, 2008)

Well.. I use Nikon Picture Project.  It's alright I guess, my computer isn't so great, so loading takes a loong time but the program is alright.  Nikon also has this program you can download from their site that lets you export the pictures out of the Picture Project collection so you can re organize them and view them with a different programs, which is nice because in the actual program, you can put photos in all sorts of folders and collections, but the physical files are stored in folders sorted by date, so having the program to export all of them and re organize the real files is helpful.  Nikon also has something called "View NX"  I haven't tried it yet, but it looks pretty cool. (anyone have any experience with it?)

I like iPhoto from what I've seen, and lightroom, but since I'm poor and have a windows machine, that doesn't work so well.  As for linux...I still haven't found any good viewing/sorting programs.  GIMP is amazing, but its an editor..


----------



## rooky (Apr 6, 2008)

I view with windows vista photo gallery then open in photoshop 7.0.1 for any adjustments.


----------



## Sark (Apr 12, 2008)

I like Faststone Image Viewer.

It can use the mouse wheel to navigate back and forward through the images. If you associate your files with the viewer, you can work with Windows Explorer and it's just a matter of double clicking the first file in a folder and it will open in fullscreen. Then just scroll to view all images in that folder. Esc takes you back to the original folder, or double clicking opens the Faststone browser window. You can also enable Colour Space awareness for your images.
On a dual monitor setup you can enable it to show the browser on one monitor and the full screen image on the other.
There's a compare option to show several images side by side (complete with there histograms if you want). It will create the usual multi page PDF's, slideshows and screensavers and has most functions you'll need in its batch processing dialogue.

Worth a look, if only because it's free.

Sark


----------



## Garbz (Apr 13, 2008)

Hmmm also looks nice but again it's only source space aware. I need the other end of colour management. An application which will correct the colour to look right on my screen which does not use the sRGB gamut.


----------



## Chris Stegner (Apr 15, 2008)

Wow, not a Bridge user in the group? Actually quick, down and dirty stuff I use iPhoto, but mainly bridge. I like that I can group images within Bridge. I do a lot of Panoramas so I go though my shots and "group" them together in final panorama image folders.

Are any of the packages mentioned Macintosh compatible? I do think Bridge is slow so I'd like to find a small "footprint" package.


----------



## lifeafter2am (Apr 15, 2008)

Lightroom.  Organizes everything, makes life easy, backs up to NAS easily.


----------



## Jim H (Apr 15, 2008)

Primarily Bridge. Lightroom when I know I need to set a white balance across a ton of images from the same shoot.


----------



## Parago (Apr 15, 2008)

Lightroom. Love it, love it, love it. Don't know how I've ever lived without it.


----------



## mrodgers (Apr 15, 2008)

Lightroom as a _simple_ viewer?

I think the thread is about something that acts like windows explorer would, with better image viewing features.  You can see your directory of images, click on one and view it full screen.  Use scroll wheel, arrow key, spacebar, whatever to move from image to image.

Lightroom isn't all that _simple_ to be used as just a viewer.


----------



## S2K1 (Apr 15, 2008)

I use Adobe Bridge to view, but would also like something with a smaller footprint on my Mac.


----------



## Parago (Apr 15, 2008)

mrodgers said:


> Lightroom as a _simple_ viewer?
> 
> I think the thread is about something that acts like windows explorer would, with better image viewing features.  You can see your directory of images, click on one and view it full screen.  Use scroll wheel, arrow key, spacebar, whatever to move from image to image.
> 
> Lightroom isn't all that _simple_ to be used as just a viewer.



Why not?

I pop the card in, Lightroom opens automatically, app. 3 mins import (we're talking about RAW files) and I can view my images beautifully, heck, I can even make a stunning slideshow with 2 mouse clicks. Doesn't get much simpler than that.

Now if I had JPEGS on my card, I'd prolly go with something different, but Lightroom is the prettiest, most intuitive and most flawless RAW software I've come across so far..


----------



## Garbz (Apr 16, 2008)

Crack open my folder of images. Double click on them, lightroom import dialogue? No I'm after a viewer. Lightroom is not the type of application this thread is about.

If it takes more than 1 second to load, takes up more than 15mb of ram and doesn't open the image full screen and allow me to scroll between images with the mouse or keyboard it is not as far as I am concerned an image viewer that I would want to use.

Windows picture and fax viewer would fit the bill except that as I mentioned in the original post I need colour management to display images correctly on my screen. So far I've been playing with ACDSee Pro2 but it's a bit on the slow and clunky side. I like Irfanview and use it on other computers now that it was recommended but again colour management is lacking.


----------



## Parago (Apr 16, 2008)

Garbz said:


> Lightroom is not the type of application this thread is about.



Oh I guess then I misunderstood. I thought this thread was about what other people ARE indeed using as viewers. No?


----------



## mrodgers (Apr 16, 2008)

Tis why you should always read a thread rather than just view the title/subject and respond.

He specifically states he is looking for a viewer that is light (lightroom, not), views full screen (lightroom, not AFAIK), scrolls with mouse wheel (Lighroom does this), and is color managed (Lightroom does this).

Thus, the "light program" meaning light in resource usage and full screen viewing cancels out a suggestion of Lightroom.

Can you get _all_ of those wanted in a simple viewer, I don't know.  But people posted quite a few suggested programs as a simple viewer, which Lightroom is not simple.


----------



## Garbz (Apr 17, 2008)

Yep, but it's ok. I don't read the full thread myself at times. Don't get me wrong I use lightroom all the time. It's just not a viewer to me. It's a full blown digital photo editing package. And I would personally be happier if they kept all that photo sorting stuff out of it and kept it more like bridge, but that's just my opinion.


----------



## vladiator (Apr 23, 2008)

I also like FastStone Image Viewer.  It's the fastest image viewer I have been using...and it's FREE.  I've been using it for about two year now.  I've tried Picasa many times and I have uninstalled it everytime...I hate the virtual folders and labels it creates.

I love the keyboard shortcuts that FastStone has...makes it very fast.  They have added color management in the later two versions I believe.  Color management is somewhat rudimentary but it's adequate for me.  I believe it's worth a look.


----------



## bhop (Apr 23, 2008)

Bridge.



Chris Stegner said:


> Are any of the packages mentioned Macintosh compatible? I do think Bridge is slow so I'd like to find a small "footprint" package.



Which version of Bridge are you using?  The CS3 version is a million times better than the older versions and is much better as far as speed goes.


----------



## D-50 (Apr 23, 2008)

Bridge for CS2 works fine for me. It is a bit large but if I just run that and photoshop I have no problems at all. Bridge is great because it will open a file directly into Photoshop.


----------



## Garbz (Apr 24, 2008)

Yeah CS3 despite being an upgrade actually runs well on my old laptop. The entire suite that is. CS2 was terribly slow especially on loading times. I was most impressed that adobe managed to literally half and then some the CS3 startup times for Photoshop and come close to that with Bridge too.


----------



## D-50 (Apr 25, 2008)

CS3 sound nice then. After becoming fed up with a slow computer I purchased a new comuter solely for photo editing.  No internet no other appilcations (aside from Itunes). I'll tell you what my computer runs like you would imagine a computer should, things open immediately and editing time has been cut in half, large file load in the blink of an eye.  I opened 25, 50mb tiffs in CS2 and it took about 30 second to open them all.  I strongly suggest dedicating a computer to photo editing.  Yeah its a pain to go between computers when you need to upload a file but the time you save editing more than makes up for the hassle. Also there is not the temptatio to surf the net while editing photos.... All business!


----------



## Garbz (Apr 25, 2008)

Bit of knowing how windows works, and computer maintenance does go a long way. I do the equivalent of a full format every 2 months. Especially for this reason. I say equivalent because I don't actually format, I just have an image of my C: on another computer which I load back regularly.


----------



## Zorac (Apr 26, 2008)

depends on the day and what im doing, sometimes viewnx, sometimes fsviewer, sometimes adobe bridge


----------



## Alex_B (Apr 26, 2008)

XnView, it is for free, easy to use, convenient for me


----------



## Drake (Apr 30, 2008)

ACDSee 5, for performance reasons. I need just a browser - to have a quick look through my photos, delete the crap ones, rotate some of the keepers, with a quick access to a full-screen feature. That's it, no need for more stuff. Now I usually shoot RAW so the Bridge from CS2 has become my primary photo browser. I only wish it had a 100% preview feature like the CS3 one, or at least it would be nice to have such a plug-in. It would help to determine sharpness without launching the cameraraw plug-in.


----------



## 250Gimp (Apr 30, 2008)

I use Bridge with CS2, but on my computer I would not consider it a 'light' application.

Drake, just select your photos in Bridge and run a full screen slide show, but use the cursor to move from photo to photo and delete the ones you don't like.

That's what I do.

Cheers


----------



## Drake (Apr 30, 2008)

I've just found a better one, you can select multiple images and open them all at once in the cameraRAW. This way it's easy to zoom in to 100%.


----------

