Seriously, Painter has to be one of the greatest digital art tools ever created. For what it does well, it runs circles around similar functions in Photoshop. I’ve been noodling with it since Version 3. But I’m about ready to shit-can Version 12, and I’m not interested at all in Version 13. To the point that I let my free 30-day trial of 13 lapse without having tried it once.
Why?
Because 13 and most of 12 had been rendered unusable by multiple glitches.
Because Corel, who now owns Painter, does not appear to care about customer service, its customer base, or broadening the software’s reach in the artist community.
A friend of mine has been having the same problems I’ve been having with the new versions. When he asked Corel nicely for help, he was referred to the Painter community forums, a very skilled group of artists who have had to take up the slack on Corel’s lack of service. No, bad company, your customers should not be having to do their own customer support, much less serve your entire customer base.
When my friend wrote back recently for clarification, this is partially what Corel had to say:
“Thank you for contacting Corel Warranty Support.
While you are within your warranty period, the question you have submitted falls outside of the scope of your coverage as troubleshooting issues are considered priority services. Your Free Limited Warranty technical support incident is meant to resolve issues related to installation and activation to get your product up and running.
Strike one, Corel.
If the issue is not resolved, we recommend the following options:
1) You may purchase a Priority Support ticket: http://www.corel.com/corel/product/index.jsp?pid=prod4150136 or a Training and Support plan: http://www.corel.com/corel/pages/index.jsp?pgid=800173 to get immediate direct access to priority technical support services. This will get you in touch with an agent directly, who can provide personalized assistance, and in many cases even remotely access your computer and help resolve the issue.
Please note – if you are reporting a validated product defect we will be happy to provide support at no charge. Rest assured if the issue is confirmed to be a Corel product defect, you will be reimbursed by the technician investigating your case.
So, we pay MORE money, which may or may not be reimbursed at a time of Corel’s choosing, so a Corel rep can maybe answer our questions?
2) We invite you to visit our extensive online Knowledgebase: http://corel.force.com/index for frequently asked questions and answers, troubleshooting articles and step-by-step instructions.
Tried that. Got nowhere.
3) Additionally, one other place we often suggest for support would be our user forums – you can find some of our most knowledgeable and helpful users there, and we continue to be impressed with the creative suggestions solutions that are found in the Corel Communities: http://www.corel.com/corel/pages/index.jsp? You can also check out our Corel Support & Learning Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/corelsupportlearning
Oh, you mean the artists who love Painter enough to try to do your whole support job for you?
Honestly, Corel, if you don’t care enough about the Painter software to support it and market it properly, just sell it to Adobe.