What's your favorite image browser?

I've been using ACDSee as my primary image browser for many years. I like it, I'm used to it, and I'm way overdue to update it to the latest version. But, before I do, I'd like to see if there is something better.

I've been playing around with Picasa also, lately. I use it at work for work-related photos. It's not bad, and it's free -I even recommend it to point-n-shooters for basic editing- but I find some of it's quirks annoying.

I downloaded BreezeBrowser, at the very strong recommendation of a well known bird photographer. The two-week trial period didn't convince me to buy. I didn't find anything special about it - maybe I just overlooked its best features.

I use Adobe Bridge for sorting through unconverted RAW files, but it really doesn't excel at browsing already-processed JPEGs.

What do you use? What do you like or dislike about it?

I do all of my editing in PS3, but if I am just looking thru them I am really coming to like Photo Gallery that comes with Windows Vista. WIth the RAW converter installed, I can view all of my RAW shots, and I import them from my camera by date and it organizes them the same way. If I wasnt invested in PS3, I would invest in Adobe Lightroom, and would probably use it for browsing and editing. They have done a really nice job with it, and I hear have made some fantastic improvements on the newest version.

Buck,

Nikon ViewNX is actually a very nice tool for browsing through jpg files. It doesn't matter which camera they came from. It has dual monitor support, you can even do some basic adjustment if you need to. It is free from Nikon. Being a Nikon product, it will also browse Nikon's NEF files but not other manufacturers' raw files.

If find it quick and easy to use. Also it is free. Have a look at the Nikon USA site in their knowledge base. Latest for Windows is V1.1.1. I won't put a link in my reply as it a very long one and not sure how it will get displayed.

HTH,

André

I like FastStone Image Viewer. Very fast, free, and reads Canon RAWs.

I concur with NikonView, even if you are not using Nikon and are only wanting to look at JPEGs.

I use an image browser simply for sorting, titling, moving and deleting images after a shoot. All real PP work I do in PS. So the browser provided by Canon and bundled with the software included with the DSLR camera bodies works just fine for me.

I really like Lightroom, I've been using it since it was first introduced as a beta program. It has matured nicely, and while there are some things it still needs (softproofing mainly), it's very powerful and intuitive. Just my 2 cents.

Well, I am a Mac man. I bring my files (jpg's) (not using RAW yet or have a need to use it yet) over to the computer. Then I use an add-on called QuickImage which is found by highlighting the files and <control-clicking> on any file. I then use QuickImage to add the thumbnail to all images. I look at the thumbnails and delete what I passed over deleting in camera (D200). Then I highlight 6 or so images at a time and use the Apple Preview application. I then delete from there whatever else did not come up to par. I am then left with the images I want to run through Photoshop where I delete some more! One of the lessons I learned was to edit edit edit. I am now left with the images that I will "work" on and then save as a Tiff with a new name and then save again as a jpg at the 8 setting. I then rename the original files to the same as the saved, but with a "-O" at the end of the filename. So, I end up with three files of everything I am saving. The process is faster than it sounds and the only software I purchased extra was Photoshop. I am still considering Lightroom or Aperture...but am waiting to upgrade my computer first to handle one of those efficiently. Ok, that was too much information, but maybe someone will appreciate it!

Troup Nightingale

I have been using FastStone for the last 3 months and I am hooked to it. It provides very easy to use and fast tools for image viewing, image conversion and image correction for most types of RAW files. The user interface is great (lets you view the images on full screen mode by default) and you can learn some of the keyboard shortcuts over a period of time to speed up facilities for organizing the photographs. The best of all it is small and light and it is free. You can download it from http://www.faststone.org.

- Murali

Like Buck i have been a ACDSee fan for many years. Buck the newest version is certainly work the money. I use CS2 and ACR for RAW file formating paintshop pro photox2 for image fixing. Picasa is a great little program especially for doing quick presentations to show clients.


William

Another vote for FastStone.
Quick, intuitive and the price is right.

Here's another fan of ACDSee. Drag & drop, batch renaming, 8.0 handles RAW files. If I'm missing something, I don't realize it.

Ken

I use Breeze Browser now then finish up in CS2

Guerry

I'm a Mac guy and Aperture 2.1.1 is very nice. Multiple ways to tag, rate and store your shots, and really terrific handling of RAW. The "Smart Albums" feature is worth the price all by itself. When I bought Aperture, I compared Aperture 1.0 pretty carefully with Lightroom 1.0, and thought Aperture was much better. I don't know how Lightroom 2.0 compares.

Thanks everybody!

I'm using Windows XP, so the Mac suggestions don't apply in my case. I hadn't heard of Photo Gallery, but since it's Vista, I don't have it.

I downloaded Nikon ViewNX and gave it a test drive. Being a Canon shooter, it probably never would have occurred to me to download it. I think I like it a little better than Canon's Zoombrowser. But it can't see Canon RAW (.crw or .cr2) files.

I also downloaded FastStone Image Viewer. I was impressed. It's a great image browser - very similar in the way it works to ACDSee, so it's just the sort of thing I was looking for. It's free - so that's a big plus. (ACDSee was free, or maybe it was shareware, when I first started using it.) You can move through your picture files very quickly using the mouse scroll wheel. This is a feature that I really like. FastStone also is very intuitive and customizable. And it can see my Canon RAW files. FastStone has already replaced Picasa on my office computer. And it looks like it'll probably replace my outdated version of ACDSee here at home.

A big thumbs up to FastStone from this ACDSee user.

Thanks again.

I have used Breezebrowser for years both for editing and RAW conversions with all processing done in CS2. I have been very happy with this workflow.

I use NX, Lightroom, coupled to CS3 and Bridge. Lightroom works the best for me, and with the improvements in 2.0, may become my stand alone, with minimal use of CS3. Also, Adobe has released the Beta versions of ACR for the Nikon user--I have tried it linked to Lightroom internally, finally, the colors are starting to get to where they are suppose to be--reds are actually red and not orange. I think they are on their way to a fix that will make converting raw in NX obsolete and remove the extra step. IMHO

Check out a huge number of detailed reviews over at DAMRoundup.com - great resource!