I just shot my first location, and I am loving this photography stuff! I took a couple hours on Sunday morning to shoot some nature photos at a park with a lake using a Nikon D3300 with both the 18-55mm and 55-200mm lenses.

[ See my favorite shots from the day at Flickr here... https://www.flickr.com/photos/160854297@N08/sets/72157667509392858/ ]

Now I need to learn about Post Processing these photos. I would appreciate any advise or useful tutorials to which you can link me in order to continue my education.

Thanks! -Tom

I just shot my first location, and I am loving this photography stuff! I took a couple hours on Sunday morning to shoot some nature photos at a park with a lake using a Nikon D3300 with both the 18-55mm and 55-200mm lenses.

[ See my favorite shots from the day at Flickr here... https://www.flickr.com/photos/160854297@N08/sets/72157667509392858/ ]

Now I need to learn about Post Processing these photos. I would appreciate any advise or useful tutorials to which you can link me in order to continue my education.

Thanks! -Tom

Organizing your photos is a very important aspect. Were I getting started now, I would be inclined to use Lightroom, for that reason. Which ever way you end up, you want to give the organizing problem good thought. I think processing is something you just grow into. You should do a lot of reading and youtubing to get the lay of the land so to speak. You already have very good advice here. I like the suggestions of free, and get your feet wet using something. You don't have to rush to a decision. There is an almost religious distain among some folks for using PP at all, but for most of us it is an integral part of the photographic process. As you settle in, you will identify things you are particularly interested in doing with your photos beyond the basics, and could find yourself adding an additional program from time to time for the way it handles a specific task. I use photoshop. Its what I got started with. I doubt that I would have had I not had a friend usher me into it. Its a program deep and vast. It can be confusing for sure. Im pretty sure you wouldn't call it intuitive, but once you get the hang of doing things with it, you wouldn't be willing to part with it. Thats my two cents worth.

Organizing your photos is a very important aspect. Were I getting started now, I would be inclined to use Lightroom, for that reason. Which ever way you end up, you want to give the organizing problem good thought. I think processing is something you just grow into. You should do a lot of reading and youtubing to get the lay of the land so to speak. You already have very good advice here. I like the suggestions of free, and get your feet wet using something. You don't have to rush to a decision. There is an almost religious distain among some folks for using PP at all, but for most of us it is an integral part of the photographic process. As you settle in, you will identify things you are particularly interested in doing with your photos beyond the basics, and could find yourself adding an additional program from time to time for the way it handles a specific task. I use photoshop. Its what I got started with. I doubt that I would have had I not had a friend usher me into it. Its a program deep and vast. It can be confusing for sure. Im pretty sure you wouldn't call it intuitive, but once you get the hang of doing things with it, you wouldn't be willing to part with it. Thats my two cents worth.

I started with Photoshop because I won it in a drawing. Hard to learn? Yes!!! But so glad I did. (and am, since I am pretty sure you can never completely learn it-there is just SO much there!) . Later people told me to just use LR because it's easier but I always end up back at Photoshop, and now it doesn't seem that difficult. I'm glad I started there.
Here's my question. My clone stamp and blur tool are terrible. I have CS6. I want to try out PS CC but I worry about what happens when I can't afford it (retirement is looming) and need to go back to CS6. What will I lose? And is it worth the money when I am not doing 3D, animation, etc. If you started with these free programs, then switch, is it a problem?