Camera-bundled software: Is it any good?

by Ben Stevens, Technology Researcher Photo Editing 28/12/2011

We don’t choose our cameras based on the software that’s included in the box, and for Sony it might be a good job that we don’t. We put the camera-bundled photo-editing software from seven major brands to the test with the best and the worst being poles apart.

In September, I voiced my suspicions that the installation of software supplied with cameras is nothing but a waste of time and space, as there are many better options, many of which are free. I also surveyed Which? members and was surprised to hear that 60% of digital camera owners use the supplied software.

I then rounded up basic digital cameras from Canon, Fujifilm, Nikon, Olympus, Panasonic, Samsung and Sony to put their bundled software to the test.

The results

There was a huge gulf between the best and worst camera-bundled software. We put the software through the same software tests that Which? puts paid-for software, such as PhotoShop Elements, and free software, such as Google’s Picassa, through.

While these bundled packages are sufficiently different from the editing suites, and are fundamentally designed for viewing and managing photographs, some offer a versatile array of features and tools, and we felt the test would give us a decent comparison.

Samsung’s Intelli-Studio topped the table, scoring an impressive 68% – a score that would be good enough to receive a Best Buy should we be handing them out.

The Sony Picture Motion Browser that came bundled with the Cybershot DSC-HX7V, on the other hand, scored a woeful 18%, highlighting some serious limitations and a lack of versatility.

: Click to enlarge

As with many of these suites Sony PMB really is just designed for managing pictures, which it does a good job at. However similar packages from other brands offer much more beyond basic photo-management, which is a task that frankly doesn’t require any dedicated software.

The Canon and Nikon programs seemed designed to offer photo-correction rather than to provide many creative features.

Camera-bundled software reviews

Samsung Intelli-Studio
Canon Zoombrowser EX
Olympus Viewer 2
Nikon ViewNX2
Fujifilm MyFinePixStudio
Panasonic Lumix PHOTOFunStudio 6
Sony Cybershot Picture Motion Browser

In the full reviews you’ll be able to read about the specific features of these programs including colour adjustment, cropping and resizing. We look at how accurate the automatic-correction features are and how well the red-eye removal tool works.

We look at which file formats are supported, how easy the software is to install, and how stable it is (one of the seven programs crashed twice during our tests).