i wouldnt even bother with PS if i didnt have to.. in fact, most of my work is done usign Ulead phototimpact (all the way back since v5) which is now up to version 12... in turn, it does almost everything PS can do, and it also supports PS plugins. Its less boggy, doesnt require too many resources and is cheaper than PSElements. Also has warp, clone and correction tools which are identical to PS, it doesnt however have the same type of RAW support as Lightroom and CS3 do.. but for JPG's you can go wrong with it... very easy to work with.. i cant recomend it highly enough.. a very underated program to say the least

I think you're right, not that I've used Photoimpact but as I very slowly plumb the depths of PS I realise you can devote a whole career to learning all of it and for basic photo touchups it's probably huge overkill. For serious restoration and commercial photography the cost and the learning curve is justified but most of that's 14th coat of wax stuff.

I would agree that PS suffers from the general Adobe user-unfriendly cumbersome learning curve. It's also not only a crucial app that integrates nicely with Vegas, but I've found that it is one of those apps that people just assume you have if you're dealing on a professional level. Also, for what you'd need to know for video-related usage, you could be getting around it in a week or two. (VASST offers a couple of training DVDs to get you going as well).

If you're just doing work internally, then you can choose what direction you want to go. But MHO is that it's a good idea to have some version of it if you will be receiving graphics from outside sources. Despite what outside graphic artists use to create, they all will be able to provide you with a PSD - at least, that's been my experience.

Photoshop Elements V5 is a great tool. Does a lot more than you might think. For the average photo touch up, it will work quite nicely. I might also recommend ACDSEE Pro. It is one of the best database/photo management suites around.

JAB

I use The Gimp. It does everything I need (few things I want). For the price ($0) i'm NOT complaining. Between that & Inkscape I haven't need an adobe product in years.

It's not up on the latest Adobe features but I don't really care. I'm not in the mood to spend nearly $1k every few years for an app I do touchups, small fixes, cropping, etc. on.

I even got my dad, who used photoshop all the time, to go to The Gimp simply because it got to the point (like me) where people gave him PSD's that didn't work in his version from newer copies.

For stills in the real world elements does most things - in fact i'm still using PE3 even though I have CS2, but as far as I know only CS3 is functional on video. Someone put me right if i'm wrong or expalin further.

Thanks for the insight, folks! I'll definitely look at some of these alternatives a bit. But my wife, who also runs a business forms company, says her experience with clients using programs other than full PS (such as Elements) has been frought with file compatibility problems. I'm not up on all that---particularly with dealing with professional printers, who seem to speak an alien tongue---but she's under the impression that only "real" PS provides all the output and conversion capabilities necessary to deal with the outside world. True?

MH Stevens,

I believe it's the Extended version of CS3 that gets you video capabilities. And for that you have to lay down even quite a few more pretty pennies.

Over the life of my career, I've played with a variety of image editors. None of them really come close to the professional standards of Adobe Photoshop. Beleive me, I'm no fan of Adobe, but, when it comes to still photo editting, I wouldn't think of using anything but CS3. I'll concede that if you're not a professional still photographer, you can get by with something else, but, photoshop is an business standard. There's a reason Photoshop is built the way it is, not the least of which is the RAW file converter. I keep LighCrafts Lightzone on my desktop for accomplishing what Photoshop, sometimes, can't do.

I started with PaintShopPro and my friend had a copy of Photoshop he didn't need, so I got in cheap.

I love the Levels histogram in Photoshop, very intuitive and useful.

One thing to consider is the amount of tutorials and scripts and actions written for Photoshop. The community should be considered along with the tool.

If I have to do something quick I go to PaintShop because I'm more familiar with it, but if you do a lot of photo editing, eventually you have to reckon with Paintshop.

I agree 110% with CS3 being a standard in any professional environment. however for minor projects and teh like Uleads option is a good one and its not as "clunky"

The fact remains, that even though PS is a tool of this stature, there are otehr tools out there that can do the same work in less than half teh effort/time

CS3 was a major leap foreward and even though i do use it, i still go back to my old PI12 if i really want to hack through piles of pics...
Lightroom is one tool which i cant recomend highly enough, it has changed the way i work with RAW (Ive got a 5d) and the options available at import (ie curve and levels scripts running as the files are imported, saving that entire process) is great. I can do this with Canons' DPP and to be honest, i find the shrpness and levels tools better than Adobes, but for some reason, Lightroom just feels different... works better as a hands off kinda thing.. for hands on stuff, DPP is great

ok time to shut up

Didn't know about LightCraft and I must say wow!, very intiuitive for touch up if we compare to shadows/hilights in PShop... glad you mentionned it Bill

Photoshop 6 is perfectly fine for most photo work. The only real downsides I can think of are that it doesn't support camera RAW formats, and it's 16bit capabilities are a little limited. Oh, and there's the down side that you these don't have forward compatibility with newer versions of Photoshop.

The one caveat with 6 and 7 is that you shouldn't allow it to change your file associations when you install it. These versions created a problem if you associated common image formats with photoshop. Explorer would crash when opening folders with lots and lots of associated files because Explorer would have to refer to a Photoshop DLL for each file.

Rob Mack

Sean,

Photoshop Elements should be enough for what you explain. I have PSE5 and it suits my needs. There's only been a few times where I wish I had CS, but not enough to justify the extra cost.

A great site with PSE info is photoshopelementsuser.com

For a very long time I was a user of PhotoImpact. As I recall, all the way from version 8 to Version 12. I also kept a copy of Photoshop CS2 handy, but always felt overwhelmed when I tried to use it, so stuck with PI. Recently I had a friend helping me with some projects and the photos needed alot of retouching, levels, color curves, etc. Also, I wanted to try my hand at custom menus for DVDA.

We got to work..me in PI and him in PS. Then I started comparing the results of his work with mine. The correction tools in PS seemed to do a better job than those in PI. Over the past month I've given myself over to PS and am happy with the results compared to what I have done in the past with PI.

There still are a few things that I find much easier in PI, but now it is just the opposite for me. Most of my time in PS, some in PI.

Galen

I'm also a long time PhotoImpact user. For basic stuff, esp. batch processing it's great. I've had major issues with Adobe in the past but I'm PhotoShop is a much more advanced program. Kind torn these days as I do a lot of still photography and like some of things I see people doing with PhotoShop.

Here's the best I can do in PI: pic (BTW - that's me in the pic :-) )

photoshop extremes..

http://www.neatorama.com/2007/05/13/weight-loss-with-photoshop/

this will give u an idea of what can be done with warp, clone and paint tools with a myriad of brushes