Morning Star Loc: West coast, North of the 49th N.

James, considering that you already have PSE, I suggest you take some steps to learn to use it.
You didn't learn to walk without falling a number of time, nor did you learn to drive a car without making some stupid mistakes. Learning takes time, effort and concentration. But the end-results are well worth it. Having said that, there are some programs and people that are not made for each other, but don't decide that a program is not for you after two or three sessions - give it a fair try first.
PSE is a good start: very similar to Photoshop, just not as extensive. It will also give you a taste of ACR (raw processing), and cataloguing your photos, just not as extensive as LightRoom.
Once you feel "ready for more" you could add Elements+ to PSE, for just $12, giving it a good number of the capabilities of Photoshop.
I don't upgrade PSE more than every other year, making it cost me about US$2.58 per month.

JCam Loc: MD Eastern Shore

Jim, Other than the old Picassa editing program that is no longer available, I haven't seen any PP that is really intuitive, especially not anything put out by Adobe. They all have some learning curve. However, if you are running a Windows OS you may be able to download the FREE Windows Live programs, one of them was a pretty simple post processing; it worked well, but I don't know if it is still available. I used it for a while before switching to PSE.

Trust me on this: If you get into PP, you will use layers! It is automatic for some things you will want to do!

DavidJon Loc: Ada, Oklahoma

I second the use of Affinity Photo. It is definitely one powerful editor with more capabilities than most of us will ever learn. True, unlike Lightroom it will not catalogue your photos but anyone who knows how to make directories can catalogue their own photos.

Jaackil Loc: Massachusetts

James
Let me share my experience with you as it sounds like there may be some parallels I started out with a version of elements that came free on a computer I bought. I also used Picasa. When that computer crashed I lost access to Elements and so I was forced to seek out a new editor I tried a lot of them including GIMP. I finally settled on the CC subscription because it was at the time an inexpensive way to get the full Photoshop. I was not really interested in Lightroom. I played around with Photoshop and learned it as I went along using YouTube videos. When I came across something more complex than adjusting color or exposure I just googled what I wanted to do and watched the video. Then I discovered RAW. I was very reluctant to use Lightroom because I already had my own catalog system and I did not want to change that and I had heard there was a huge learning curve with it. Here is what I found out. Lightroom is an awesome program! It is pretty easy to figure out some of the basics and get started and as you get into it there are tons of videos and tutorials to learn anything you want to do with it. So although there is so much you can do with it the learning curve is manageble and you can learn As you go along. As far as the cataloging I still use my own file system and Lightroom's too. Lightroom is completely non destructive with both editing and cataloging. Meaning your images do not reside in Lightroom and no permananant changes are made to the original images or files So my catalog in Lightroom has no effect on my file system on my hard drive. As I get more confident with LR I am slowly transitioning to using the Lightroom cataloging more and more. The way I have it set up now my Lightroom catalog is pretty much arranged the same way I would arrange my files on my hard drive so it is becoming seamless. As for the editing I now do about 90% of my editing right in Lightroom It is great because unlike PS it is non destructive. It never changes your original raw file. So I can make all kinds of adjustments in Lightroom to an image and if I open that same image directly in PS I can start with the original raw file. Here is the best part though. If I want to take the adjusted Lightroom image to PS for further editing I can do that too with one click! Both programs are pretty amazing and in my opinion they are the gold standard for post processing. Don't let the learning curve scare you if you know elements already you will get comfortable with LR and PS pretty quickly. While I know both now pretty well for my own purposes every day I find a new trick or technique that I can use. So while you can get up and running quickly with the basics the possibilities are endless and that is pretty exciting. I would suggest trying the 30 day free trial of CC. You have nothing to lose its free. Come back after 30 days and let us know how it went. I am guessing you will be happy you gave it a try. Good Luck.

robertcbyrd Loc: 28754

Affinity Photo. Tired of saying it. One time cost, lifetime updates, nice interface, support is improving rapidly.

via the lens Loc: Northern California, near Yosemite NP

Thanks, and I did not mean to imply that it was not a good program.

Patrick9 Loc: Muncie, IN

If you don't want to spend a significant amount of time learning a program, (nothing wrong with that, it's your life), use what you have or download one of several free programs. My current choice is Affinity Photo.

SusanFromVermont Loc: Southwest corner of Vermont

Very true - lots of sources for learning.


The problem with working with both the LR Catalog and your own file system separate from LR, is keeping track of where everything is located. I suppose you are used to this system, but for anyone starting out it would be better to just work from within LR. This prevents having "missing files"! And changes made from within LR are automatically applied to the files on your HD.


PS is also non-destructive if you know how to use it.


Yes, you can do edits directly on your RAW file, [where you can choose to "Edit Original" or "Edit a Copy With LightRoom Adjustments" to continue with what you have done in LR]. When you choose "Edit Original", then choose "Save" it will go back into LR and still be in the RAW format. I am pretty sure that the original RAW file will be changed and cannot be retrieved. However, if you choose "Edit a Copy with LR Adjustments", LR will make a copy to send to PS and your original will be preserved. And you are correct that if you go back to PS and do added edits, you will be starting where you left off before.

HOWEVER if you go to "Photo" --> "Edit In" --> "Open in Photoshop as a smart object", it is protected so you can always go back to the version imported into PS. Then when editing is done you can choose "Save As" and choose a different format. This gives you a separate image file, without changing the original. .TIFF is the one I like because it retains all the work you did in PS, so you can then go back and do additional edits. For re-edits you choose "Edit in Adobe Photoshop CC 2017", and choose either "Edit original [to see your edits and work on it some more] or "Edit a copy" [for making changes that you want to save as a separate image].

via the lens Loc: Northern California, near Yosemite NP

I'm not sure why people keep insisting that there is a "Lightroom cataloging system." There is only one system of setting up all of your files and YOU do that, not Lightroom, and YOU do that on a hard drive that is within or connected to your computer. All Lightroom does is link to what you have set up. This program does not have a brain that wakes up and says, "Hey, I'll move this folder here or there today." YOU, the user, always instruct the program to do something, even when it turns out to be wrong. YOU set up your filing/folder system and then YOU decide what folders to link up with LR. Perhaps you only want to link some files, which can be just fine, if you are not ever going to use those files again for anything, or you can link all files on your hard drive and thus have access to your entire library of images. I have chosen to always link my images to LR so that I can edit and locate them as needed, this allows me to find any photo within minutes since I use the keyword system. Please everyone, Lightroom does not have a brain and does not catalog your images, you control it and you decide on how the images are managed. Yes, this thinking does, obviously, drive me wild. Apologize for the rant...

wteffey Loc: Ocala, FL USA

I rarely show anyone a photo until I have looked at carefully through Elements (now version 15) and made preliminary adjustments. Just me. If you have no interest in photo editing yourself perhaps you can find someone who would be willing to do it for you. I enjoy improving photos almost as much as I enjoy taking them (maybe more), so I look forward to helping those who do not. If you find someone to help you can just give them the card with the photo, save it to a USB stick, or even email it. They can return the edited version the same way, or order prints at Walgreens for you to pick up. If you decide to try your own photo editing, I found Elements 15 on Amazon for $39.95. Elements begins with basic (click here dummy) edits, and proceeds through expert in you want to go further. They also include interesting features like "turn a frown into a smile", haze removal, motion simulator and shake reduction, all of which might save a photo you might otherwise discard. All have guided instructions that anyone can follow. 16bit vs 8 bit? Probably not significant factor for most people.

via the lens Loc: Northern California, near Yosemite NP

I don't use Elements but someone said it does help you to organize your photos in some way? How does this occur with Elements? Just curious.

papakatz45 Loc: South Florida-West Palm Beach

I agree. For most of us on this forum Elements will do all we need. From cataloging, to processing RAW to final edits and printing.

papakatz45 Loc: South Florida-West Palm Beach

You organize your photos as you want. Elements just keeps track of everything for you. By using keywords and albums it will help you to stay organized and find any photo you need to find.

via the lens Loc: Northern California, near Yosemite NP

To make a statement that "for most of us on this forum...." means that you must know everybody on the forum? There is also an implication of some sort here, although I'm not quite sure of what it is, that is disquieting to me. Are you saying that 99% of the people on this forum are at the same photographic level? I just don't see that. I see a broad range of skills represented, some advanced and some not so much, but it does appear that a large number of the people who speak up may be in the beginning stages of photography, which would make sense since they can benefit the most by speaking up. Obviously you are very comfortable in making this pronouncement, but I think that Elements might work for many people but not work so well for others. Thank goodness we have many, many programs to choose from to find the one that suits each of us best.

Morning Star Loc: West coast, North of the 49th N.

PhotoShop Elements consists of several parts: The most important (to me) is the editing program.
But it also has a part called the Organizer. I have never used it, because I find everything I want to do to organize my photos, I can do in Windows File Explorer.
You select Editor or Organizer upon opening the program.