Photo Editing Programs

This week we’re going to discuss photo editing programs.

One of the questions we are most asked, besides which camera do we use, is what software do we use. We use Adobe Photoshop. For last several years, it has been the “gold standard” in photo editing programs. However, it’s price is not for the faint of wallet. Before you give up and decide to go back to film, there are several alternatives that perform well.

For the amateur and advanced amateur, we like to recommend Adobe Photoshop Elements 4. The interface is relatively easy to use for the beginner, but has many of the same powerful features that are found in the full version of Photoshop.

Adobe Photoshop Elements 4 includes Adobe Album, which used to be a separate program about 3 years ago. You need only connect the camera/card reader to your PC, and Adobe will import your images (from your camera or card reader) to the file folder you’ve chosen. If you haven’t chosen a location, don’t worry. Adobe sets a default location automatically and using the preferences menu you can change the default location anytime you wish. Once the images are downloaded, you can preview them using the new Organizer (formerly Album) feature. The images are organized initially by time/date taken. However, Adobe allows you to create tags to help you organize your images. The tags can be people, places, things…pretty much however you want to organize your photos so you can find them again. Another nice feature is the timeline feature. If you can’t remember the tag, or didn’t put a tag on your image, but you remember the image was taken on your summer vacation last year, the timeline feature allows you to move to the time the images were taken (from the metadata embedded in the image).

Within the organizer, you can choose to perform simple edits or advanced edits. For 80%+ of the images, the simple edit feature should meet your needs. The function and features found in the simple edit mode are the same ones found on many of the other photo editing programs, like Microsoft’s Image Suite. These functions include red-eye removal, cropping, and color, contrast, brightness adjustments. If you find that you need more than the simple functions, Adobe gives you the advanced editing mode, which is Photoshop Elements. Within Elements, you have many of the powerful editing tools like the healing brush, and cloning tool. Elements also has the ability to work with layers, channels, levels, and contains several filters to help enhance your image. The latest version of Photoshop Elements even includes the ability to extract a portion of an image easily and place it onto another image. Previous versions of Elements, as well as software from other OEMs, required tedious and careful selections.

One of the other reasons we recommend Adobe Photoshop Elements 4 is that once you learn how to use the features/functions in the software, making the transition to the full version of Photoshop is relatively easy compared to transitioning from another photo editing program like Image Suite, or Nikon’s Capture or Picture View. These programs cost about $79 - $129, depending on rebates, sales, and location purchased. At the time of writing this, the cost for the Adobe software was $99 less a $20 rebate. If you don’t meet the requirements of the rebate, Sams Club was selling the software for $89.

One of the biggest challenges for using any software is learning how to use it. There are many books written for “dummies”, “idiots”, and so on. How many of us have the time to read a 200+ page book cover to cover (not to mention usually a very dry book that would put even the worst insomniacs asleep in less than 5 minutes) ? Fortunately, there is a better answer. A few years ago we discovered a web site that provided online training, at a very reasonable price. The site is http://www.lynda.com/ . At the moment, they are only offering training for Photoshop Elements 3. The course is 11 hours in length. The cost is $25/month for access to ANY of their online training tools. So, if you finish Photoshop Elements training in a week, you can also take MS Office training, Digital Photography Training, and so on. It’s a great way to get hand on training.

Another source for Photoshop training (remember Elements has many of the same features as the full version, but not all) is http://www.photoshoptv.com/ . There is also a Photoshop Elements newsletter available that has tricks, hints to help you.

Here are on our blog, we will be starting to discuss different Photoshop and Photography tips.