Virus Scan for Stepok Picture Enlarger

Stephen Dakos The trial program is not working for me. I'm running Windows 7 Pro 64bit. When I launch the program and get the "Buy or Evaluate" window, I select evaluate, and the program immediately closes. Task manager confirms that it is not running.

I've tried installing the 32b version, tried installing and running both versions as "Administrator," but still no luck. I would really like to purchase this program, but the failure of the trial versions are worrisome. Any ideas to solve this problem? --- Thanks ---

Apr 25 2013 at 7:02pm Copy Link

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Chen Qi Please check your computer if there are enough disk space on temp path. (2G)

Stepok Image Lab. - Apr 25 2013 at 10:09pm Copy Link

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Stephen Dakos I have a minimum of 50gb on all drives.

Apr 26 2013 at 10:26am Copy Link

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S B Picture Enlarger seems clean and intuitive.

If I may ask some questions I cannot otherwise find answers to:
1) Does it handle images with noise?
2) How does it handle JPEG artifacts?
3) Are there limits to the image size?
4) How does it work with very small JPEGs?
5) How does it compare with its competition (Perfect Resize, Blow Up, etc.)?
6) Will there be enhancements?
Thanks!

Apr 26 2013 at 10:57am Copy Link

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Stephen Dakos Update on my previous launch problems: I uninstalled both versions, then reinstalled the 64b version while in safe mode. It corrected the problem. Nice looking program.

Apr 26 2013 at 6:00pm Copy Link

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Brenton Robinson I am currently using the trial version of Stepok Image Enlarger and it looks like a nice program. I can't seem to save a particular image folder as my favorites. Is this a limitation of the trial version? It is tedious having to find my photos folder every time the program loads. Is there a way to get it to remember the current working folder?

Apr 26 2013 at 6:30pm Copy Link

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S B @Brenton Robinson: I have the same problem (64b version).

In a few tests I've made, the Image Enlarger doesn't seem to be quite a Perfect Resize or Blow Up, but it *does* seem generally to do a good job, and is not nearly as expensive.

There are a very few rough spots in the UI (e.g., some workflow awkwardness, the unassignable favorites folder, the "It's a Vector ..." button), but the UI does have a number of very nice usability touches!

I'm in.

Apr 27 2013 at 12:21am Copy Link

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Chen Qi 1) Does it handle images with noise?
2) How does it handle JPEG artifacts?
There is a NR mode. but it is not recommend to use a bad quality input.
3) Are there limits to the image size?
no.
4) How does it work with very small JPEGs?
I'm not sure how small it is, 32x32?
5) How does it compare with its competition (Perfect Resize, Blow Up, etc.)?
It have better perform on hair and texture with the 'fake texture' feature. For more detail, I don't think it is good to make judgment of 3rd party program, as the author.

Stepok Image Lab. - Apr 27 2013 at 11:04pm Copy Link

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Frank Stephens Only you know what you're looking for, so I don't think that it's fair to ask vendors to compare their products to others, especially obscure products. BenVista PhotoZoom Pro was just on sale for 1/2 price and there's no comparison in terms of features and image quality, but Stepok Picture Enlarger is available here for 1/3 of even that reduced price. Now, if you're comparing the full price of Stepok then you could compare it to BenVista PhotoMagic, which I haven't tried and have no interest in, but none of the lesser products have the algorithms and features that PhotoZoom Pro has.

Apr 28 2013 at 2:08am Copy Link

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H. H. @vendor
could you please clarify the fineprint (no native english speaker)
1. "After you make a purchase of this BitsDuJour discount promotion, Stepok Picture Enlarger may be used for 1 month."
- does this mean, that one is only allowed to use the software for 1 month /monthly subscription?
2. does the software make use of hardwarefootprint / online activation

H.H:

Apr 28 2013 at 6:09am Copy Link

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S B I have purchased a license for Picture Enlarger--here are my quick impressions--your mileage may vary.

Picture Enlarger is quite simple to use, and has very few resizing adjustments. Though simple, the workflow seems non-standard. For example, double-clicking on an image from a gallery shows that image all alone, with only navigating forward or backward possible. To resize an image, select it from the gallery without double clicking it. Then select the "Enlarge it!" button at the top. You can have more than one image open at a time.

You can select several images and process them as a group; this makes sense for handling the multiple images involved in web galleries, etc. When doing so, there is an easy mechanism to specify the resulting filenames for the newly resized images.

Conveniently, image sizes are shown (and resizes can be set) in pixels, inches, or centimeters--and the inch/centimeter size are based upon the "Resolution" setting you enter (though always dpi).

Performance
For photographic images, Picture Enlarger seems to be better than Photoshop's raw "Image Size..." adjustment, but Photoshop does have lots of other tricks up its sleeve for tweaking images (some take practice).

I have found that for photographic images, Picture Enlarger is also marginally better than IrfanView's resize for *small* images and much better than IrfanView for larger images.

Picture Enlarger seems to do quite a good job in enlarging "vector-based images".

It does not handle JPG artifacts well, except in JPGs of vector-based images .

Settings

The "Add fake texture" checkbox which seems to very lightly enhance the appearance of texture in linearly-textured areas. In addition, I have occasionally been able to remove some JPG artifacts by checking it.

There is a "Remove noise before enlarging." checkbox. Unfortunately it's much too strong and removes not only the noise, but also many details. I hope its level will be adjustable in future versions.

"Add grain" is adjustable and nice (but be careful).

There is a "It's a vector based image" button. It seems only to reset the levels of "Enhance edge/Sharpen" and "Grain" to zero.

There seems to be no help: pressing F1 brings up a browser with help for the company's Light Developer product which shares some user interface, but nonetheless I found this help unhelpful.

Resized images can be saved as jpg, gif, tiff, bmp, or pcx files.

There is a whole modal area that comes up after committing to saving the resized image as JPG. It has many options (several aimed at the quality and size of the saved file), all with understandable names and some have comments, but it isn't apparent how all of them work or interact.

My Conclusion
All in all I'm happy with my purchase. As it is now, Picture Enlarger is certainly not a Perfect Resize or Blow Up, but it typically does at least an adequate job of resizing -- and often more -- and there is obvious room for improvements, and I hope and trust that we'll see those improvements in future versions.

Apr 28 2013 at 2:39pm Copy Link

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George Butel Do you contend that your program will do a better job of resizing an image than if I go to CS5, or Photoshop Elements 11, or even ArcSoft PhotoStudio, all of which I have, and resize the image in those programs? Are you saying that your algorithms are better than Adobe's or ArcSoft's? I don't know; I'm just wondering.

Apr 28 2013 at 3:14pm Copy Link

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Brenton Robinson @vendor
I would be very grateful if you could address the issue of the favorites photo folder not being saved. Will this be fixed in future updates? Thanks.

Apr 28 2013 at 3:16pm Copy Link

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S B Re: Picture Enlarger vs Perfect Resize, Blow Up, PhotoZoom, etc.

I think it's fair to ask a vendor to compare their product against others because it gives the vendor a chance to speak to the philosophies and strengths of the product and to distinguish the product from the others--on its own terms!

I think that Frank Stephens *is* right about "obscure products," though in specialty niches like this, all products are "obscure" and vendors as well as many users are quite aware of the field and the available products.

I have purchased a license for Picture Enlarger and have explored and used it on a variety of images. I posted a quick, positive review several hours ago; sadly it has not yet appeared.

I did find that Picture Enlarger, though very new and still with some rough edges, delivered often very good results at a fraction of the price of the big, but perhaps obscure names.

Apr 29 2013 at 10:07am Copy Link

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John H Just installed the trial.
After installation and after I start the program, it wants Administrator Privileges?

What's up with that? Please be specific.

Jun 1 2014 at 8:45am Copy Link

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Louis H What can this program do that Stepok's Recomposit Pro does not do?

And if it can do something different, will these features be incorporated into a future upgrade with Recomposit Pro? (Similar to how features in Light Developer were moved into Recomposit Pro.)

Thanks

Jun 1 2014 at 12:19pm Copy Link

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Chen Qi This program will write registry in its first time running for common trial or register purpose So it will popup Administrator raise dialog.

And Recomposit pro doesn't provide same algorithm as this program. This program provide more options,details and controlling.

Stepok Image Lab. - Jun 1 2014 at 1:43pm Copy Link

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Louis H Thank you, Chen!

Jun 1 2014 at 1:50pm Copy Link

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Steve Hudek Your product page does not show this product name. Is this the same as Recomposit or Recomposit Pro?

Jun 2 2014 at 4:36am Copy Link

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H. H. @vendor
unfortunately the question regarding hardware footprint stayed unanswered since last bdj offer, so that was the de3albreaker.
That´s why I´ll ask again:
does the software make use of online /hardware footprinted activation procedure?
thank you for clarifying in advance
H.H.

Jun 2 2014 at 7:54am Copy Link

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Louis H @Steve Hudek - When I go to the webpage listed above, I can see a link to take me to the page for this program. I can also access it from the menu that drops down if I select the PROGRAMS tab at the top pf the page. It does not show up, however, on the page where it shows the difference between the other programs. If you go to the "BUY" page it shows the differences between four programs.

It is not the same as the resizing feature in Recomposit - Pro or Plain.

What I have discovered working with the trials for both programs.

Recomposit - Image Size in Pixels Only. Has a button to keep proportion or not. Offers 5 different algorithms for resizing - Nearest neighbor - Biliner - Bicubic - Advanced - Fixed x2. All but Advanced only offer you the option to set the width and height. With "Advanced" you have a checkbox to keep (or not) edge vectors. two sliders - one for details when scaling down and the other for Sharpness when scaling down.

Picture Enlarger - Offers you 12 Preset size changes - from 1/4 up to 8x. You can set the Width and Height in Pixels, Inches, or cm. You can set the resolution. You have an option to crop the source file. You have an Enhance edge/Sharpen slider and one for Grain. You have a Remove noise before enlarging checkbox and one to add "fake texture" along with a slider to set the amount of "fake texture." You have a button to let it know it is a vector based image.

Recomposit Pro has a "Content aware" resizing option. I could not find this in Picture Enlarger. It may be there, but i did not find it.

Picture Enlarger does have a Photoshop Plugin so you can access the program direct from Photoshop. (I tested it with PS CC only.)

You would really have to run both programs to see if the differences matter to you. Recomposit Pro is going for around $89 right now and this program is $29. I found the quality of the resizing of this program to be worth the $29 for me. With my test runs, it did a better job than Recomposit Pro. I cannot afford Recomposit Pro right now, so I went with the program I would actually use. (I cannot see anything I would use, otherwise, in Recomposit Pro at this time. If the vendor ever offers it at a really nice discount - here on BDJ (hint,hint) - I might pick it up, but for now it is worth the $29 for what i will use Picture Enlarger for.)

My other question to the vendor, which was not answered, is in connection to how he changed the previous versions of Light Developer and moved some of those features to Recomposit Pro. There used to be three different versions of Light Developer. Now there is one. Is the vendor going to phase out Picture Enlarger and move the additional features into Recomposit Pro. (Which would make Recompsoit Pro the program to purchase.)

Jun 2 2014 at 9:30am Copy Link

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Chen Qi The stepok picture enlarger is not the main product of us so on webpage you see Recomposit, that isanother bigger program. And the SPE does not have a plugin because Photoshop does not allow the plugin to change size of input image.

about the register system, Im sorry I can not tell more.

Stepok Image Lab. - Jun 2 2014 at 12:06pm Copy Link

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Louis H Not to disagree with the vendor about his own program, but.....

Re: Plugin - I found a PS plugin file with my SPE and placed it in the plugin folder for PS CC. It is named StepokEnlarger.8bf and is in a folder installed by the program install file. The folders name is Photoshop Plugins.

I am able to open an image in PS, select SPE under Filters, make my changes to the image, apply in SPE and it loads the resized image back into PS for me to keep working on it. I call that a plugin. True, the actual work is done in SPE, but i do not have to open it by itself, save the image, and then open the image in PS. So perhaps it is simply a cultural difference in definitions of the term "plugin?"

Jun 2 2014 at 12:45pm Copy Link

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Gr3gw I'm very interested in Picture Enlarger but I think I will need more than 24 hours to evaluate it. Is there any chance the deal can be extended?

The function of Picture Enlarger is to make a larger image. I have a printer that takes A4 paper. Does Picture Enlarger have the ability to print a large image across multiple A4 pages that can later be put together? The evaluation version does not print.

Jun 2 2014 at 2:50pm Copy Link

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Chen Qi No, currently no such function support print to multiple A4 paper and merge them together.

Stepok Image Lab. - Jun 2 2014 at 7:11pm Copy Link

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Gr3gw Thanks, Chen.

If I enlarge an image to 4000 x 4000 pixels, will the image save as 4000 x 4000 pixels and when printed to an A4 printer, reduce the image to fit the A4 page? (The answer may be obvious to many but image sizes confuse the hell out of me.)

Also, I notice that Picture Enlarger does not list the A and B drives on the left hand side. I now use these as hard disk partition drives and so I would like to see these drive letters listed when drive is non-empty.

Jun 2 2014 at 8:20pm Copy Link

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Wild Wizard Was Wondering..Your Website Says "Stepok Image Lab offer a 30 day free trial on products and a 30 day money back guarantee so there is no risk involved.
No risk, safe purchase and download"

Is That Also True For The Purchase Of This Program Through BDJ ??
30 Day Money Back Guarantee After Purchase Here ??

Thank You In Advance !
Best Wishes
Blessings
~~Wild WIzard~~

Jun 2 2014 at 10:34pm Copy Link

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Chen Qi The image size in pixel you need is dpi*paper size. But in SPE, the print function will automatically select the best. To print in other software, normally the dpi shall not less than 200, typically 300.

Stepok Image Lab. - Jun 2 2014 at 10:44pm Copy Link

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Wild Wizard @ Chen Qi......You Didn't Answer My Question ?? It Was Posted Before Your Last Response ....No Answer No Buy TY !

Blessings
~~Wild Wizard~~

Jun 2 2014 at 11:59pm Copy Link

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Chen Qi Yes, 30 days too if the software does not work for you.

Stepok Image Lab. - Jun 3 2014 at 12:32am Copy Link

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Wild Wizard @Chen Qi......Thank You For Your Kind Reply However The Promo Is Over :-( Would Have For Sure Bought At The Discount Price....Will Try The Trial Version, And Hope You Offer The BDJ Discount Again, I'll Be Looking For It :-) Thanks Again Just 33 Mins Late For This Time....
Take Care
Blessings
~~Wild Wizard~~
TY

Jun 3 2014 at 1:04am Copy Link

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Gr3gw Yes, if I'd known of the 30-day return offer I would have paid to have a decent amount of time to evaluate SPE. Twenty-four hours was just not enough time and the restricted trial version made proper evaluation a challenge in the time allowed.

Jun 3 2014 at 1:56am Copy Link

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H. H. @vendor
unfortunately the question regarding hardware footprint stayed unanswered since last two bdj offers, so that has been the dealbreaker twice.
That´s why I´ll ask again:
does the software make use of online /hardware footprinted activation procedure?
In case harewarefootprint is used, can the license be deactivated in case of planned pc-change? What´´s to do in case of disk-formatting - can it be reinstalled on the same machine again without problems?
thank you for clarifying in advance
H.H.

Feb 23 2015 at 2:09am Copy Link

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Chen Qi Yes, the software will activate by server. Normally it will be no problem when move to another computer by normal reason, if not, please contact the author.

Stepok Image Lab. - Feb 23 2015 at 11:35am Copy Link

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Grum Pah What version of the software is this? I have already tried Version 1.0 and wasn't impressed.

Feb 24 2015 at 6:46am Copy Link

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Chris @ Grum Pah ~ It is v1.2 ~ I like it pretty good. ~ Download the trial and see how it works.

Feb 24 2015 at 8:46am Copy Link

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Grum Pah @Chris, I installed this version and found it to be virtually identical to Version 1.0 widely available for free on the Web. It does hardly anything to improve small bit size files, which is what I wanted it for.

Feb 24 2015 at 12:33pm Copy Link

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Chris @ Grum Pah ~ Have you tried PhotoZoom Pro? It costs alot more but has alot more fine tuning features.

Feb 24 2015 at 7:41pm Copy Link

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Grum Pah I'll have to give it a look-see. Thanks!

Feb 24 2015 at 8:04pm Copy Link

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Nico Westerdale Great News! Stepok Image Lab. has agreed to extend this deal for another day - Enjoy!

BitsDuJour Admin - Feb 25 2015 at 12:11am Copy Link

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Susan Epstein I downloaded this yesterday and also downloaded SmillaEnlarger (free). I did a quick test on a bitmap and a jpg -just using the defaults in both programs. The results in SmillaEnlarger were better in both cases.

Feb 25 2015 at 3:53am Copy Link

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Grum Pah I liked PhotoZoom's interface and tweaks, but the end result wasn't any better than the SmillaEnlarger that Susan found for free. That said, I haven't found that any of these programs perform "miracles" on small images. I'm not even sure it's possible.

Feb 25 2015 at 5:14am Copy Link

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Chen Qi We have free trial so everyone can have fair comparing between those products.I suggest using some typical testing images like
http://stepok.net/Picture...ample1.jpg

to know the differences between products. And if not compare side by side, those product are looks 'same'.

Stepok Image Lab. - Feb 25 2015 at 11:32am Copy Link

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Jon Spain How does this compare with Reshade (now free)?

Feb 9 2018 at 1:19am Copy Link

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Nico Westerdale Great News! Stepok Image Lab. has agreed to extend this deal for another day - Enjoy!

BitsDuJour Admin - Feb 10 2018 at 12:11am Copy Link

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Jon Spain So the vendoe can't or won't say anything?

Feb 10 2018 at 10:36am Copy Link

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Stefan Hauber So, just one computer.
Not 'one computer + one laptop' (as often seen here ) or is this possible?

What to do, if I want to change the computer I want to use it with, e.g. because my former computer is exchanged/defect?

Apr 18 2019 at 6:43am Copy Link

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