Choosing a Photo Editing Program

When it comes time to touch up your digital photos, you need a photo editing program. You can choose a low-priced, consumer-oriented program or a high-priced program targeted at professional photographers. For most of us, the consumer- oriented programs are more than adequate and, in fact, you might have received one bundled with your new PC or digital camera.

If you're in the market for a low-priced photo editing program, here are the most popular programs in use today:

• Adobe Photoshop Elements (www.adobe.com)

• CorelDRAW Essentials (www.corel.com)

• Paint Shop Pro (www.jasc.com)

• Microsoft Picture It! Photo (www.microsoft.com/products/imaging/)

• Roxio PhotoSuite (www.roxio.com)

My favorite of these programs is Adobe Photoshop Elements not to be confused with the much more expensive (and harder to use) Adobe Photoshop. The Elements program is extremely easy to use, with one-button operation for most common photo editing tasks as you'll see next.