If you work much with digital photos, sooner or later you’ll probably come across the need to edit a batch of photos, applying some form of edit to all of them. Regardless of whether or not you use something like Photoshop, Lightroom, or another image editor, sometimes the right tool for this job is one specifically designed for batch operations – like BatchPhoto from Bits&Coffee.

What is it?

BatchPhoto is a batch photo editing software program for Windows and Mac that can process multiple photos in an automated or semi-automated manner, applying specified actions to each one. There are 50 edit actions that can be applied. BatchPhoto calls them filters, but they’re more than just an Instagram-like filter. These filters include things like applying text, watermarks, resizing, rotating, image touch-up, and many more. Each filter has settings so that you can customize each filter to do exactly what you want it to.

What’s in the box?

The download for BatchPhoto is 34.5MB for Windows and 56.2MB for Mac. The download includes all available versions and has the ability to unlock the full (paid) version with a product key so there’s no re-downloading and installing the paid version if you decide to buy a license.

The installation was pretty much a standard installation, nothing unusual to mention.

When you first start the program you’re presented with a dialog where you can choose which version to evaluate. There are three versions to choose from, Home, Pro, and EEnterprise.This review covers the enterprise version. For a comparison of features included in each version, see the comparison chart.

BatchPhoto is available in the following languages: English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, and Japanese.

Design and features

The program uses a simple wizard-like three-step approach:

• Step 1: Add photos.
• Step 2: Edit Photos.
• Step 3: Setup.

Clicking the “Process” button starts the real action of the program, processing each image with the settings you have specified.

Although the program is wizard-like, you can jump between steps at will. You can even skip step one if you’re going to be using a profile to automate the processing of images at a later time (more on profiles later).

Step 1 – Add Photos

BatchPhoto handles just about every image format there is. It can process over 170 image formats, including quite a few RAW formats (including Canon, Sony, Nikon, Olympus, Fuji, Kodak, Pentax) that photographers use. It can also output to almost all of these formats as well. Some formats can’t be output to, like RAW files that are specific to digital cameras.

You can add photos via drag and drop or browsing for specific files, or adding files from a folder or multiple folders. The photos list also includes multiple view modes such as detail list, small icons, medium icons, and large icons (icon meaning thumbnails). A Preview window is also in this step and supports zooming.

Step 2: Edit Photos

In this step, you specify filters and file renaming options. This is the heart of the program. There are 50 filters, each with its own customizable settings. You can do just about anything that you would want to automate.

There are far too many filters here to cover each one individually, but I’ll include screenshots of the filters here, along with a couple of their edit dialogs as well.

Step 3: Setup

This is where you setup the output options. You can specify the output folder, output format, and other miscellaneous options.

The output options are:

• Folder on your computer
• Send via E-mail
• Upload to FTP
• Upload to Flickr
• Upload to Facebook

PDF, TIF, and GIF output formats can create multi-page files where all of the images are included in a single file.

There are also settings for setting the output photo’s date and attributes to match the original file, as well as an option to delete the source file after processing.

Processing

One of the key features of BatchPhoto is its ability to process multiple photos at the same time, greatly reducing the time it takes to process photos. For those who are into technical stuff, this means it will use multiple threads to process the photos. There’s also an option to turn this off if you want.

One of the things I really like is that you can save your settings as a profile for easily loading those settings later, and applying them to batch operations using the “watch folder” feature of the included monitor program. For example, you might have one profile for processing “proof” images, and another profile to process “final” images or one for outputting small images and one for outputting large images.

One thing I did note is that you save the profile via the file menu, but you load them via the wizard menu. BatchPhoto includes many pre-defined profiles for your convenience including a “Convert to PDF Album” that will output your photos to a PDF file and a “Send via E-mail” profile.

Automated processing

BatchPhoto includes a utility program called Monitor. It can be launched and will run separately from the main program. It can be configured to watch a local or FTP folder for new files. When the new files are detected, it will process them automatically based on a specified profile.

This is a very powerful feature for users that want to automate the processing of files. An example use would be to automatically process and upload files simply by copying or moving them to a watched folder. As soon as that folder is checked (at an interval that you specify), the new files are automatically processed.

Semi-Automated processing

BatchPhoto also includes the option to integrate into the Windows Explorer shell. You can simply select your images, then right click and choose BatchPhoto then Apply Profile and the program will prompt you to select a profile and the selected images will be processed with that profile.

What I like

• Very versatile in input and output formats
• Video tutorials on the BatchPhoto website.
• Profiles for quickly specifying options
• Output option for processing the files to a subfolder of the original folder.
• Configurable file renaming options.
• Multiple thread output. 7 threads on an 8 CPU (4 Core) system.

What needs to be improved

• I would like to see a ZIP output format where all the files would be created and then moved into a zip file.
• I saw errors outputting files using the grunge frame with multiple files while using multi-processing. The error did not occur when the setting was turned off.

Final thoughts

BatchPhoto is an excellent batch photo processing solution. It provides powerful editing features, superb configuration options, as well as great output formats and destinations. Whether you’re an amateur or a professional, you’ll probably find that this program will meet most, if not all, of your needs.

Price: $29.95 – $129.95
Where to buy: BatchPhoto
Source: The sample of this product was provided by Bits&Coffee

The post BatchPhoto software review appeared first on The Gadgeteer.

Filed in categories: Reviews

Tagged: Photo editing software, Photography, Software

BatchPhoto software review originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on May 29, 2018 at 10:00 am.

Note: If you are subscribed to this feed through FeedBurner, please switch to our native feed URL http://the-gadgeteer.com/feed/ in order to ensure continuous delivery.

We are in the middle of a popular photo explosion, in case you’ve been hiding under a rock for the past decade. Not since the introduction of the Brownie camera in 1900 has there been such interest in photography by the general public. For $1 (about $30 in today’s money), normal everyday people could make this new thing called a “snapshot” and share it with friends. Today, with no processing and printing needed, this happens instantly, rather than in a few days when the roll is finished, sent off, and returned. With this amazing power comes tools to make our photos even better than the smart lens systems and photo software built into our cameras already does. I was offered a copy of a program called Photolemur that is able to clean up rough camera shots and bring out the data that is there.

Note: Photos may be tapped or clicked for a larger image.

I came to photography late in life. When my Lovely Bride and I went on one of our first real vacations sans-kids in 2001 to the Berkshires, I bought a Kodak DC3400 Zoom. It inspired me to walk around with a camera, and soon I was moving up to better and better hardware, learning all the little bits of info I could about lenses, fstops, aperture, depth-of-field, bokeh, filters (the glass kind, not the software kind), and photo-editing software. Much of the hardware we use today automates much of that manual adjustment into a half-press on the shutter or a tap on the touch screen to activate auto-exposure and autofocus. The framing and composition of the photo still takes a good eye, or, at least, an attention to the craft. But the post-processing is still a maze of adjustments and exposure curves. I can do it if I have a particular shot that I want to go deeper with than the simple “enhance” button on most software, but Photolemur takes this to a new level.
The app itself brings up a single window with the directions: “Drop photo here or Import.” The “Import” button just pulls up a file picker dialog box.
Once you drag/drop or import an image, some type of software magic happens, and soon, your image shows up with a “Before/After” bar that you can drag from left to right to see all the changes that the software will do. There’s a button on the right lower corner that lets you export (rename, move to other drives, etc.)

That’s it. You either like the transformed photo or you don’t. I choose some of my first photos to show here, since they were taken with a very old camera, by a newbie photographer, and just to revisit some nostalgia on my part. I’ve got a few of these framed around the house, and have even sold prints of one.

The round stone barn above is from a Shaker Village in Western MA. Note the vibrancy of the grass and the better definition of the stones on the After side. I like the improvement here. But full sun with large blocks of color is pretty easy. Let’s walk inside.

The back stairs out of the kitchen were behind a partially closed door. The wood grain attracted me, as did the light. I like how Photolemur brightened the wood without losing the crispness of that grain. The newel post on the left was helped immensely, but it’s easier to see the difference in the floor.

Bright sun again, and, being one of the first dozen or so shots I had taken, I really over-exposed that middle post. But I caught the dragonfly sitting on it, and that was my goal. The green of the background flowers of this “After” shot is too artificial to me. Those leaves are soft and fuzzy, and the software makes them out to be slicker.

A few months after this, my job sent me to New York City to lead a software launch. (This was August of 2001 – before 9/11.) This was the view outside my room.

That building on the right that is split shows how well the software pulls the details out of the shadows. I’m happy with this improvement. (This is from the New Yorker hotel looking out across 8th Avenue if I recall correctly. If I stuck my head out the window and looked right, I could see Madison Square Gardens.)

We went up to Times Square and walked around after dinner. Three guys with an iguana passed by on Broadway as my group was standing on the curb, and I fired off a shot. Photolemur really helps pull out colors here. (It was about midnight, with loads of neon, motion, and shadows.) Check out that look on the driver’s face. I never saw that before.

Further down the block, things were a little quieter, and I captured this charcoal artist at work. The software over-compensates in this shot, to me. The roadway and even the artist’s arm have a bit of a green cast.

Next night, I walked over to Rockefeller Plaza, as one does. It was late summer, so the ice rink was replaced with a restaurant and dance floor.

This shot from behind the iconic statue of Prometheus has a few better highlights, but the background detail is far improved. There is another band member to the left of the trumpet player, and those little globs floating above Prometheus’ left hand are cymbals from a drum set. You can see them clearly in the After shot!

So, as you can see, Photolemur can pull some amazing data out of what may be a pretty decent shot to start with. It combines color saturation, brightness, and contrast based on how it’s algorithm interprets your photo subject. Sometimes it’s spot on, but sometimes, it goes a little overboard.

If you’re not “into” photography, or just want to run through a batch of photos, you may really like having a simple drag and drop solution to processing your pics. If you’ve spent a lot of time learning Photoshop, Aperture, LightRoom, or The GIMP, or even Graphic Convertor, you may feel you can do as good or almost as good a job as this. With the subscription pricing, you could sign up for a month or so after a vacation, run through your photos, then unsub. At $36 a year, it’s still cheap by the standards of normal boxed software, even if it is a one-trick pony. If you’ve migrated to iOS or Android for more of your photo and post-processing, moving it over to an actual computer just to tweak details may be more than you care to do.

Source: The sample for this review was provided by Photolemur. Please their site for more info.

Filed in categories: Reviews

Tagged: Photo editing software, Photography, Software

Photolemur photo editing software review originally appeared on on May 25, 2017 at 9:02 am.

Note: If you are subscribed to this feed through FeedBurner, please switch to our native feed URL http://the-gadgeteer.com/feed/ in order to ensure continuous delivery.