Any good Irfanview Subs for the Mac?

[Hogleg 44]

I sure would like to find a good viewer for my new Mac, like Irfanview, that displays images quickly and has some adjustment capabilities.
Also, something like Chris Breeze's Downloader Pro and Breezebrowser Pro That can download batch rename and add IPTC data...but I guess that's asking too much! Those are a few apps i will miss most in my switchover.

(So far, XP is very very squirrely running in Parallels, and I am not sure how dependable it will be for the Breeze Programs. It won't even let me copy and paste, or drag and drop or install progs from a CD!!! There is something wrong somewhere!)

[srwatters]

I don't know about 'free' programs, but I use PhotoMechanic from CameraBits. It's worked well for me over three years. It's not cheap, but I use it as the head of my workflow and sorting. You can get a free demo from them with an email request. Nice customer service people also.

[billbunton]

Ditto PhotoMechanic. I used to use BreezeBrowser Pro and Downloader Pro on Windows. They were both replaced, quite handily, by PhotoMechanic. (Though I must admit I'm starting to do the whole bit in LightRoom at times).

[srwatters]

I guess I need to download the Lightroom demo and give it a whirl. My biggest hesitation is that I don't do much batch processing. Most if not all of my editing is single image based per set. Rarely will I process more than two or three images per lighting/wardrobe look so the batch processing capabilities just don't appeal to me.

Am I missing anything else WRT Lightroom?

[LilleG]

I use iView MediaPro which is also on the expensive side but does all sorts of goodies. Not sure I would recommend it however, since it was recently acquired by Microsoft and is now called Microsoft Media Expression. (I was offered a cross-grade and passed on it since there didn't seem to be much if any new features that I needed.) There is a free trial though so you can check it out and decide for yourself.

http://www.microsoft.com/Expression/...aspx?key=media

[billbunton]

I use Lightroom because it's becoming usable as a DAM product. I've used IView for years. Microsoft bought them and swore nothing would change. They have released one IView update, then renamed the product Expression Media, released it with fewer features, no bugs fixed, and a number added. They then excused themselves by saying "it's a version 1.0 product".

So I've been looking for a replacement. With LR (and Aperture) I do like having the correct previews available in the DAM program, and even more I like being able to make adjustments (WB, exposure, etc.) as I go through keywording and rating images. LR definitely has a way to go to really be a full-fledged DAM product, but for my needs it's definitely usable now. It's not really great yet for ingesting and doing initial culls, which is why I'm still using PhotoMechnic part (most) of the time.

Scott, I almost never batch process stuff. I just like being able to do all but the actual pixel editing in the same program. Getting a TIFF out to PS and then back in is slightly inconvenient because I don't want the TIFF in the same directory as the RAW, so I have to export to TIFF then open it with PS rather than exporting directly to PS. (Although in thinking about it, I could export to PS then move the TIFF...)