Editing program for an enthusiast

[IveBeenBad]

Honestly I dont want to drop $500 plus on Photoshop CS and was wondering what other programs are recomended. I was looking a Elements, but what features does it exclude?

 

[Jerunk]

Paint Shop Pro.

 

[RandysWay]

There is also Gimp, which is free..

 

[Tony Montana]

you dont have to drop 500 but you can still use MS paint ahha

 

[arkamw]

I use PS Elements and think it's fantastic. Pretty much all the power of PS without all the extra stuff that most people don't need. Seriously, I have yet to find anything that PS can do that PSE can't (with some modification).

The only thing that I don't really like is that the layers window won't stay open. If I want to switch between layers I have to hotkey it or repoen the layers window.

Let me qualify all of this: I am not an editing expert. As such, I am sure that there are many small things out there that I am not aware that I am missing.

Adobe has a full featured tryout for thirty days. Try it and see what you think. It can't hurt.

 

[Lethal]

I could be wrong, but off the top of my head I seem to recall that PS Elements only works in like RGB or indexed mode? Meaning you can't use CMYK or such for serious print work.

Eh, PSE came with my Wacom tablet but I never bothered installing it, since I have full PS.

 

[Ice Czar]

Gimp For Windows

 

[bob]

Gimp! Gimp! Gimp!!!

Be sure to download the runtime environment. For some reason, people seem to not download it and bitch that Gimp wont work on their computer.

 

[Hollow4]

Well if you know someone in high school or college then get them to use there student id and get it from CCVsoftware.com or other site. I like you do not like paying 500+ for programs, so i use my student ID all the time. Good luck.