Wow, I did not realize the vast amount of photo editing software that is available today. I have a new DSLR camera and now I want the ability to crop and “enhance” my images.
I have a 2006 version of “digital image suite” by Microsoft that was given to me but I have not installed it on my Windows 7 PC. I don’t even know if it would install.
The prices of new stuff can cost more than my camera!
Is digital office suite worth trying? If not, what should I be looking at?
You can get Adobe Photoshop Elements for a good price like at Stapels etc. This is a “lite” version of Photoshop but is like the real deal from a few years back. One thing is to get the max from this takes a while unles you are familar with photoshop
I would second Photoshop Elements. I use the full version of Photoshop (CS5.1) on my iMac. Started with a version of Photoshop Elements bundled with another program many years ago. Elements should everything you need to get your photos ready for use.
73
There is plenty of good photo editing software out there, much of it can be had for free. GIMP is a Linux / Windows program that is free, but has a steep learning curve. PhotoShop Elements is an excellent choice, but for the same price you could get Serif PhotoPlus-X5 which is in every way equal to the full version of PhotoShop and easier to use. Ifran Viewer is a good program which is also free. Google’s Picasa is also a good free choice. I do most of my work with the Serif product but sometimes require the filters that are in Elements. I also run PhotoMatix which is a high definition software, and if you are taking pictures of models and expect to submit them to MR for publication you probably cannot do with out Helicion Software.
Your camera probably came with a good editing suite which would be enough for all simple adjustments, poke through that software to see what you can find.
If you have Microsoft Office on your computer you may already have Microsoft Picture Manager installed on your machine. Go to the Microsoft Office folder, Open the Office Tools folder and you will find it hiding in there. It is a good program.
ROAR
If you want an easy to use, no frills picture editing software, take a look at Irfanview. It´s free of charge, easy to learn and does a few things to turn nice pictures into even nicer ones. It is certainly no match for Photoshop, but it suits me fine.
Just do a search using the keyword “Irfanview”.
I use freeware FastStone and CombineZP, and I paid during an on-line sale for SageLight. There is a lot of crossover in capabilities, but only CZP does the stacking function for ultra sharp depth of focus. The other two allow brush cloning, the usual sharpening, contrast, gamma, colour, and palette changes, including black and white, sepia, masks, watermarks, etc.
Crandell
Anyone who says a cheaper program is in every way equal to the full version of PhotoShop doesn’t know how to use all the capability of Photoshop.
That said, the are very few people who need the power and capability of Photoshop which is why Adobe makes the less powerful version, Photoshop Elements. Elements comes bundled with many digital scanners and cameras.
Consider getting an earlier version of Photoshop Elements as they can be picked up on the cheap and will still likely do everything you need. Consider used versions as well. Often folks will only use their disk one time to load the program on their computer and then put it away never to be used again. I picked up a very early version of Elements on ebay or Amazon and it works fine.
Lance
Visit Miami’s Downtown Spur at www.lancemindheim.com
Since I have an iMac, my editing programs are Mac-specific. However, I do have the Mac version of Irfanview and it’s a pretty good entry level program. Since it’s free, give it a try. It won’t do all the really fancy stuff that Photoshop does but it will get you into the world of photo editing without much of a learning curve. Once you get the hang of what can be done with a photo editing program you could then buy a more expensive and more complex one when you’ve mastered the basic techniques and are ready to go on to bigger and better things. You can get it at irfanview.com.
Others have given you some good suggestions for programs, but since I don’t run PC I can’t comment on them personally.
For simple cropping and retouching I actually recommend Adobe Lightroom. It serves as a photo catalog and is a very capable and powerful photo editor. Unless you’re doing lots of special effects or compositing multiple photos (adding a sky backdrop, for example) it will do everything you need and be many times more user-friendly than Photoshop or Elements.
I work full-time as a professional photographer and use Lightroom for 95% of my editing needs. I only use Photoshop for composites/panoramas, head swaps, and major retouching. LR handles all my cropping, exposure curves, and color correction and catalogues my images in an extremely convenient way in the process! I cannot recommend it enough.
I’ll add my endorsement of Adobe Photoshop Elements. I use a Nikon D-50 DSLR. I bought Photoshop Elements 6 at Walmart for around $60. and it will do just about anything that 99% of users could ever want it to do. (I believe that they are up to version 8 or 9 now). It takes a while to get the hang of using it, but most software does. Once you do, it’s pretty quick & easy to use & the results are excellent.
Carl
Bruce, go to the Source Forge and do a search there for GIMP. It’s as powerful if not more powerful than Photoshop and better yet… wait for it… IT’S FREE!!!
I use it constantly.
Cheers
CDN Dennis
In addition to the really good suggestions above – Warning: The following links are are going to make you feel like a kid going to a candy store – And is free too expensive for good stuff?
[1] Paint.Net – See out the Features and Screenshots.
[2] Portable Freeware Collection – at Graphics Editors Category.
[3] PortableApps.com – at Graphics & Pictures Category.
At the latter website, you will easily find apps mentioned above like Gimp and Irfanview – Be sure to check out PhotoFiltre.
At the two portable apps websites you will find apps that can also be installed to USB Drives and take the app with you to any computer. If you install portable apps to your desktop/laptop computer, it is a suggestion to install each program to a new C:\Portable folder instead of C:\Program Files folder. You also will usually need to go into that programs folder and create your own Windows Shortcut Link to move to your preferred program launching areas, desktop, taskbar, etc.
For years I used the full version Photoshop, I was doing a lot of wedding and portrait photography then. It was invaluable to help me create images like the one below. The amount of control, to me… has no equal.
But it is one pricey program and the learning curve is waaaaay up there.
Enter Photoshop Elements. Reasonably priced and can do most of what a model shooter wants to do.
I also hear good things about Adobe Lightroom from people that keep up with and use these programs on a constant basis.
I may even ask Santa for a copy… 
Jarrell
So what is the difference between Adobe elements and lightroom. I can get elements for less than lightroom.
Lightroom’s great strength is in managing large numbers of image files, though it has most–perhaps all–of the tools used for enhancing photos of the kind modelers take. Elements has a file management system as well, and if you’re not trying to keep track of, say, several dozen wedding assignments or thousands of travel photos, the Elements file manager will do fine. Elements has somewhat more in the way of tools than Lightroom (though that gap seems to close with each new release of Lightroom). I can’t argue with the suggestions about the free alternatives, but as has been mentioned, a copy of Elements should cost at most ninety dollars; you need not get the latest version, either. (Model Railroad Planning 2012 has a nice piece by Jim Six about using Elements as a planning tool–trying different colors on your fascia, putting in different backgrounds, and so on.)
Let me cast a vote for Paint Shop Pro from Corel. PSP and I go back at least 15 years in terms of photo editing and it still serves my needs completely. Like so many other packages, it has tools that I’ll never need or master. But what I do use serves me well. I also use it to lay out all of the decals that I print on my ALPS printer; I’ve not tried that with any of the other packages mentioned thus far…
dlm
Elements 11 was just reduced at Amazon to $50.
I just upgraded from version 8 which, to me, was a little more difficult to navigate because of tiny text and icons. PSE 11 has improved the interface and offers three levels of editing from quick to guided to expert. Also included is a photo organizer that allows you to sort photos to whatever filing method you’d like.
You can download a free 30 day trial from Adobe. Click on “downloads” and you can access free trials for Lightroom 4 or CS 6 or several other Adobe products.
http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/tdrc/index.cfm?product=photoshop_elements&loc=us
My vote for free editing and organizing software would be Google’s Picasa suite…
http://picasa.en.softonic.com/
Hope this helps… enjoy
Why pay for something you can have for free?
For simple photo editing jobs, Irfanview does a good job. If you want a tool as powerful as Adobe Photoshop, GIMP is your choice - it´s also free.