Picasa version 2 is now available and I thought it was time I gave it another whirl just to see how it had improved. First thing I did was check out the help and see if it supported the RAW (.RAF) files from my Fuji S5600. I was disappointed to see the following in the Help.
At this time, we do not support RAW images from the following cameras:
Kodak P850 (.KDC)
Adobe file format (.DNG)
FUJI S5200-S5600 (.RAF)
OLYMPUS E-300, E-500 (.ORF)
My first reaction was to say “Sod it!” and not bother downloading it but the geek in me wanted to see what it could do. I’m really glad I did because it appears to handle my S5600 RAF files with no problems at all! They display and edit fine although you can only save files as JPEGs. To be honest it displays the RAW files much faster than Elements 4 when doing full screen views and slideshows.
I have only used it very briefly but with it’s ability to edit, print, publish to Web Albums, burn CD/DVDs, and order prints online with my favourite Photobox print service, I am well impressed. I don’t think I’ll be ditching Elements 4, Zenfolio, NeatImage, and QImage just yet but I’ll certainly be recommending it to friends and relatives who want a simple and more importantly to them ‘FREE’ method of organising and doing basic edits of their photos.
I’m not sold on Picasa. Experience with the previous version(s) didn’t convince me that it was worth my time. Maybe I should take another look – you mention PhotoBox support, which would suit me. The trouble is that Lightroom has library organisation features, too. And, my web backed is Flickr – does Picasa support that, or only the Picasa Web Albums?
I also wasn’t that impressed with the previous Picasa versions but it seems much more impressive now. Like I said in my post I don’t think people are going to give up proper DAM and Editing packages to use Picasa but for those with nothing else it’s really very good.
The download is small and it found all my images very quickly so there’s not much to lose from giving it a try – except a couple of hurs of your tme.
As for direct Flickr support, I don’t remember seeing it but you can certainly mail pictures from Picasa to Flickr.
There are some experimental features in the tools options such as FTP and Geotagging that I want to try out.