[kcourt]

I have a question? What is the difference between iPhoto and Photoshop? And would the average user need both? Or what about Photo Elements?

I want to get this with my G5 as I am also investing in a new digital camera, so I only need to make basic picture corrections, as I am not a professional - only a grandmother.

Any help would be appreciated.

[KidRed]

iPhoto makers the most basic corrections but your photo can't be very horrible to begin with. Elements will make a lot more corrections but doesn't catalog and isn't free like iPhoto. Photoshop is $600.

So I think iPhoto would do you right.

[spauldingg]

iPhoto vs photoshop:

They really aren't the same thing. Photoshop is a high-end (read: expensive) program for proffesionals who need to change, manipulate, or create images for four-color (or more) printing presses: ie, magazines catalogs, posters, etc.

iPhoto is free, and is really just for acquiring, organizing and simple retouching of snapshots. You can crop an image, rotate it so it isn't sideways, and get rid of red-eye.

You can improve the contrast, and the lightness and darkness of a photo, or use the "magic wand" to take care of that for you. You can also "erase" blemishes.

I really think all you will need is iPhoto, but if you want something more versitile you can try a program called Elements, (around 100 dollars US) which is made by the photoshop company Adobe, and is a stripped down version of photoshop.

Elements is nice, but you won't get the organizing features of iPhoto, or the download-from-camera simplicity. But considering iPhoto is free, you could buy Elements anyway, and use is in conjunction with iPhoto by changing the preferences in iPhoto to open double clicked thumbnails in Elements. This way you can still do the simple editing in iPhoto by selecting a photo and clicking the edit button, or do more elaborate stuff in elements by double clicking the selected thumbnail.

hope this helps. good luck

[zigzag]

Adding to the previous comments, iPhoto is free so I would start with that and see if it meets your needs. It catalogs your photos in an easy-to-use way and has basic retouching/editing tools. It's probably all you'll need.

"iPhoto2: The Missing Manual" is a great book for getting the most out of iPhoto.

If you become more interested in image editing, you'll want Photoshop Elements 2, which is much more sophisticated (but also takes longer to learn). If you keep your eye open you can often find Elements on sale - I bought mine for only $40 after rebates.

You don't need Photoshop 7, which is $600 and is designed for print media professionals. Elements is based on Photoshop and does almost everything Photoshop does for a fraction of the price.

[kcourt]

Thanks for all your comments. It helped a lot! I think I will start with iPhoto, and if this is not enough, then I will go to Elements.

[Nai no Kami]

Originally posted by kcourt:
Thanks for all your comments. It helped a lot! I think I will start with iPhoto, and if this is not enough, then I will go to Elements.

You should.
To sum up: iPhoto is basically a photo archiving/viewer software with very little editing functions (after all, it is not meant to be used as an editor, so the features it has are more than enough for a program like that).
On the other hand, Photoshop and Elements are indeed editing software with powerful features that may take some time and knowledge to master (don't worry: there is plenty of tutorials on the web).
Another worthly point is that iPhoto os free, whereas Photoshop and Elements are not.