[Ted L. Nancy]

Looking for some opinions on what is the best photo editing software out there. This will be a Christmas gift for my wife. She mainly takes pictures of family and friends with her DLSR. She has been wanting something more powerful than the amateur tools provided in iPhoto. Thanks.

Also.. I don't want to spend $500 or anything. Maybe something in the <$200 range? <$100 would be even better.

[OreoCookie]

I would strongly suggest Pixelmator: a license costs $59 and the software has come a long way from experimental to `does all that I want and zips along on my system.' I find the UI much better than Photoshop Elements (which is also more expensive). I have bought a license back when 1.0 (perhaps 1.1) came out and I've gotten free updates since. The developers started out from scratch and if anything (and my only real comparison is Photoshop 7) is that even though many things are inspired by Photoshop (e. g. under which menu items you find things), the user interface is very Mac-like.

The developers have added quite a lot of functionality in the mean time (rules, web export, etc.) so that I don't find it lacking in any way (for what I do). Highly recommended.

[Veltliner]

What camera does your wife have?

First of all a good RAW processor would be best. With Canon cameras it's included, but not very user friendly.

For Nikons, get Nikon's RAW processor.

Other than that there is Capture One and Adobe Lightroom.

Any of those will do.

If you want to spend only 100$, Capture One is the software to buy. In my opinion, Capure One is the best RAW processor available.

http://www.amazon.com/Capture-One-4-...8967784&sr=8-1

Capture One 5 is out, couldn't find a link.

[OreoCookie]

A RAW processor is not an image editing app, it prepares images to be edited in another app. I doubt that the OP's wife uses RAW (otherwise, I guess he would have mentioned it) -- and recommending to shoot RAW to a casual user is in my opinion non-sensical. For similar reasons, I haven't recommended to have a look at Aperture or Lightroom, it's probably too complex a software.

[Ted L. Nancy]

Camera is Pentax K10D. My wife does not shoot in RAW, but has expressed interest. I think the camera came with a free license or copy of Capture One. In any event, I think the need for a RAW processor is a ways off. We'll start with the Pixelmator app. I'm sure she'll be thrilled. Thanks for the advice.

[OreoCookie]

If she wants to try RAW, let her try Aperture and Lightroom (there are free 30 day demos available for both). But there is a learning curve. In any case, they complement a traditional image editing app (be it Pixelmator, Photoshop CS4 or whatever), but they're not a replacement.