Hello,
Both are free. From what I have tried,
1. Image Studio Lite from Licor is much easier to use, but it doesn't have lane background subtraction, which I think is the best method for background subtraction.
2. On the other hand, ImageJ has more tools to do with, but if I mistake a step (eg. cropping band) I have to repeat all the steps. Also if the band is very faint or almost no band is very hard to select area under the graph.
Please share what you think about these two programs.
Thank you
Good question, I have used both for Western blots a fair bit, especially since our lab started using the Li-cor Odyssey Fc.
ImageJ is very powerful because of the many tools available for it, but for simply doing Western blot quantitation, I prefer Image Studio Lite.
Image Studio is very good for efficiently analyzing your blots but still allowing you to adjust your calculation parameters (if you're interested). The point and click tool for drawing boxes is very fast but I'm not sure I fully trust it to accurately trace my bands so I prefer to draw the boxes myself. It is also possible to look at the histogram density plots like you would in ImageJ. Overall it's fairly intuitive to use but I would just add that the UI could be improved and some of the extra features don't work particularly well (such as annotations, charts, normalization and overall navigation). Simple quantitations are straightforward but most of the nonessential features are not as user-friendly so hopefully this is improved in newer versions.
Also, I do believe you can do something similar to a background lane subtraction in Image Studio. In the background tab, select either Average or Median then set the "Segment" to "Top/Bottom". This uses the background values from above and below each box, so each box gets its own own background value (similar to looking a lane background).
Hope this helps.
Good question, I have used both for Western blots a fair bit, especially since our lab started using the Li-cor Odyssey Fc.
ImageJ is very powerful because of the many tools available for it, but for simply doing Western blot quantitation, I prefer Image Studio Lite.
Image Studio is very good for efficiently analyzing your blots but still allowing you to adjust your calculation parameters (if you're interested). The point and click tool for drawing boxes is very fast but I'm not sure I fully trust it to accurately trace my bands so I prefer to draw the boxes myself. It is also possible to look at the histogram density plots like you would in ImageJ. Overall it's fairly intuitive to use but I would just add that the UI could be improved and some of the extra features don't work particularly well (such as annotations, charts, normalization and overall navigation). Simple quantitations are straightforward but most of the nonessential features are not as user-friendly so hopefully this is improved in newer versions.
Also, I do believe you can do something similar to a background lane subtraction in Image Studio. In the background tab, select either Average or Median then set the "Segment" to "Top/Bottom". This uses the background values from above and below each box, so each box gets its own own background value (similar to looking a lane background).
Hope this helps.
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