BobT Loc: southern Minnesota

Til now, I haven't had much interest in doing much post processing to my images. But have recently seen some before-and-after examples, and am becoming convinced that this might be more necessary than I had originally thought. I'm still not into RAW. So being a JPEGer, can I still get reasonable improvements with some degrees of post work? Or is RAW the only way to achieve the max. benefit?
I have dabbled in Picasa3, but that program leaves something to be desired. I have also downloaded PSE 10, but that seems way over my head; hence hasn't been touched.
Is there any easy, yet effective, and free, programs out there worthy of my consideration? The less the learning curve the better(yet I do expect there to be some). Thanks

Cykdelic Loc: Now outside of Chiraq & Santa Fe, NM

Picmonkey

Old Timer Loc: Greenfield, In.

If your camera has soft ware with it, you might want to explore it and see what you can do with it. I am a Canon user and use their soft ware for probably over ninety percent of my processing. Most seem to over look the soft ware that comes with camera but most is adequate for minor adjustments, straightening and color adjustment. I use Canon's curve adjustment and other tools with good results when shooting in raw. I like it better that Photo Shop for raw. Picasa is one to use with out too much studying, but limited on what you can do. Fastone is one that several use.

dcampbell52 Loc: Clearwater Fl

Adobe will allow a 30 day FREE trial of their software. I have most of the different post processing programs, both free and paid. But, I use Lightroom and Photoshop 99% of the time. I also use Portrait Studio Pro as Lightroom allows me to export directly into it to continue working a shot. LR also directly exports to Photoshop and many others too.

rmalarz Loc: Tempe, Arizona

Lightzone is quite good, and best of all free. As with other applications, it comes with a free learning curve.
--Bob

pecohen Loc: Central Maine

Often you can make improvements, even on a JPEG image but your options are much more limited. Given an editor that can handle RAW it is not really more difficult to start with a RAW image. The only downside is that the files are bigger, but that is because the RAW files carry so much more information that you can use.

The free editor that I would recommend is RAW Therapee. Opening a RAW image with this software is exactly like opening a JPEG image (and despite the name, you can do both). This is not the case with all editors - in particular Paintshop Pro puts an extra step in if you open a RAW image.

RAW Therapee can be a bit intimidating at first because there are so many possibilities - but they are divided up into several tabs and you don't have to learn all of them at once (in fact there are still quite a few that still mystify me after more than a year of using the program). That's OK, most of what you need to do is right there in the first tab - the Exposure tab. And within that tab the most essential ones are at the top so you can start playing with them at first to learn what they do. By the way, there is a good on-line manual and a forum where you can ask for help.

The Detail tab I rarely used, but if this is your only editor you probably will want to use it for finishing touches. The Color tab you will probably need to use when you have an image where the white balance was not set correctly in the camera. The Wavelet tab you can completely ignore as a beginner. The Transform tab is for cropping, leveling the horizon, correcting lens deficiencies and altering perspective; you will probably know when you need these. Finally, the RAW tab I've looked at and played with but never really used. It seems to be provided for making technical adjustments to the RAW conversion in case you want to fiddle with that.

rjaywallace Loc: Wisconsin

pecohen - (quoting from your detailed suggestion) "The free editor that I would recommend is RAW Therapee. Opening a RAW image with this software is exactly like opening a JPEG image (and despite the name, you can do both)."

After opening an image in RAW Therapee, can I save it and transfer it to Lightroom or DxO OpticsPro for "developing" (editing)? Thanks for posting the suggestion.

ronwande Loc: Hendersonville NC

Fast Stone Image Viewer is a misnomer. It is a very nice image viewer but you can edit images with it. It is free. Just google it and download and install. You can download a nice (rather rambling) manual for it too.

I like it better for color correction and shadow / highlight correction than Photoshop. You can crop and sharpen with it too. Start with this one and you can move on to something more complete and complex later.

BobT Loc: southern Minnesota

Thanks to all, thus far.

Anyone use FastStone? Your comments, please.

boberic Loc: Quiet Corner, Connecticut. Ex long Islander

I do. For a free pp program it's pretty good. As long as you don't require sophisticated work. BTW if you have a Canon camera try using their DPP .

BobT Loc: southern Minnesota

boberic,

Can DPP be used for non-Canon camera images? I actually have DPP downloaded (another never used program). But now I'd be using it with a Panasonic FZ1000. Will it work for that one?

bdk Loc: Sanibel Fl.

something no one mentioned was GIMP which is a full feature editing pgm. I used it before I got photoshop and it was quite good and constantly being updated see it here

http://www.gimp.us.com/gimplp3/index-lp1.php?pk=1191809&c=Refresh

pecohen Loc: Central Maine

I have long used Paintshop Pro for my final processing - mostly for sharpening but sometimes for detailed layer work. Although I can open PSP from RAW Therapee directly, generally I save my work from RT (usually as a batch operation) and later work on a batch of 16-bit TIFF files in PSP. I see no reason these options should not be available with other editors.

Old Timer Loc: Greenfield, In.

If you already have DPP on your PC I would urge you to give it a try especially if you shoot in raw. I prefer it over Photo Shot. I use it for my down loads and Raw conversion. Is is not hard to learn. It has good help files with it.

Old Timer Loc: Greenfield, In.

I am not sure but I do not think it will work with any other brand. Each manufacturer has it 's own soft ware in the camera and they would have to be comparable. If you updater your camera with canon you have to update DPP for it to work.