lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

rlv567 Loc: Baguio City, Philippines

I have examined most of the aforementioned PP programs (except for Gimp) and many others, some free and some very expensive. While not going into great depth – yet – with any of them, I have found that there is not one program which for me will do anything and everything “best” for any specific photo! That is to say that for a given photo of mine, one program may do better denoise or sharpen – or, you name the process – while for another photo some other program may be the best; sometimes it takes two or three programs used in succession, or even multiple times, to achieve the desired result.

A program not mentioned in this thread which I thought could be excellent is Phase One, but for me it’s prohibitively expensive. For a number of years, I used Paint Shop Pro (starting before it became Corel), and have used Topaz (the basic version now is free, and anything you buy gets free updates), DxO, easyHDR, FastStone, InPixio, IrfanView, Lightzone, Luminar, ON1, Photomatix, Smart Photo Editor, the various Franzis programs and others. Maybe three months ago I subscribed to the Adobe software at $9.99 plus tax a month, and find that it satisfies most of my needs; Lightroom is quite easy to use, and does most of the processing I want. I as yet have no in-depth knowledge of Photoshop, but I’ll tackle that soon.

I shoot Canon DSLR, and have found DPP to be very good, and sometimes all I need. I in previous posts have suggested that some may wish to use Adobe Photoshop Express, which is free, very easy and quick to use (essentially NO learning curve) and will do everything desired for many photos.

My daughter – in the Palm Springs area – is a very successful professional; her primary go-to is Lightroom. I need to reiterate now the advice of others here: success as a professional photographer may be aided by use of good hardware and the right postprocessing software, but the key element is YOU – the photographer. My daughter was an Art Major at UC Riverside, and has a really good “eye”, creativity and the personality necessary to get the best out of her (human) subjects, as she does a lot of engagement, wedding and family shoots. She has good Canon equipment, which she obviously uses for that, but I have seen many of her off-the-cuff iPhone shots which are much better than a lot of the posted “professionals’ work”! It’s YOU that makes the difference!

Go as lightly or as in depth as you wish; just always make it fun!

Loren – now in Baguio City, Philippines

chapjohn Loc: Tigard, Oregon

Look at FastStone.

Brucej67 Loc: Cary, NC

There are so many photo editing packages out there and everyone has their personal favorites, but what is right for one person may not be right for the next person. My best advice is if you are new to image editing chose one of the free (or more than one) editors, learn to use it and if you want to advance from there and purchase software after learning the basics you will be ahead of the game (remember free costs you nothing but time).

Wuligal Loc: Slippery Rock, Pa.

You're 71? Just do it. I'm 79 and I just did it! Every day I learn something new and exciting in photoshop. Every PP program you try will be basically the same so you might as well start at the top. There's only one rule......enjoy, enjoy, enjoy.

rdoc Loc: Rochester, MN

I'm 81 and I love Photoshop Elements. Don't try to learn it all at once. Take it in small bites and it will all fall into place. It's worth the money.

Brucej67 Loc: Cary, NC

Only problem with Elements is it processes in 8 bit while your camera can shoot in 12 bit and higher. The argument in favor of 8 bit processing is that the human eye does not see the extra color range, but this is not the only thing you loose:

1. If you have prints made by a printer chances are you will loose image quality especially if they try to use CYMK format.
2. When you trim image bits down from a higher bit level you also loose luminescence.

The type of photography where this could make a serious difference is in Landscape where shadow detail is lost.

Bob Locher Loc: Southwest Oregon

OK. I am 75 and got back into photography two years ago after many years away, so the digital world was new to me.
Anyhow, I strongly recommend the Post Processing program "Affinity". It is not free - it is US $50. Once. Period. It will do everything that Photoshop will do except for some 3-D stuff which I have no interest in doing. Like all PP programs, the fancier capabilities of Affinity have a steep learning curve. But there are loads of helpful Videos and also they publish an excellent book. There is a lot of stuff about it on the Internet - take a look.

A less powerful program but still with many very useful features is Faststone Image viewer, which also is great for organizing your photos. I believe it is Windows only, but that works for me. Again, there is a learning curve, but it is relatively short and well worth the effort.

I would say that with these two programs and a bit of study there really is nothing else you would need.

Anyhow, have fun!

KenwardV

I currently am using darktable (and I only recently got seriously into doing this as well) followed by Affinity, which I got for free because of an X-Rite purchase. As I spend more time with darktable I use Affinity more for printing only.

darktable actually has nice online resources for folks to use as well as a number of technique videos made by others using it.

It does take time, but I'm patient.

bud 77 Loc: Long Beach, WA

Jim, I understand your quandary. I am 82 years old and got serious about photography after I retired. I tried all the free stuff and wasted a lot of time. My solution was elements. The program has several phases and allows you to start with a lot of help and work your way up to the expert level. With elements you are learning many of the features of Photoshop CC if you ever decide to upgrade. Elements does have a learning curve but by this time of your life you know there "ain't" no free lunch. It is a fifty dollar program so quite affordable. I went to photoshop cc and changed back to elements as the big program had many features I don't use and an ongoing expense each month. Good luck with your new hobby and keep shooting. Post processing adds a lot to the fun but Jpeg pictures are nice also. bud

AndyGarcia

OK I have LR but have stopped using it because of their new policy. I use AlienSkin Exposure X3 a lot. I also have Luminar, ON1 Photo Raw 2018 and Iridient Developer. Why so many you may ask. Simple I've used AlienSkin and Luminar (and it's predecessors) for some years. Same with ON1 products. Iridient I use for it's ability to handle Fuji RAW files, especially foliage, brilliantly.

All of these programmes are available on a trial basis.

I find I prefer AlienSkin as it has a beautiful soft touch in PP. Also loads of film simulation presets. Also very intuitive and easy to use.

My suggestion is try some out and chose the one you like. Lightroom served me well. What ever turns you on and gives you the results you want. I've just turned 70 - you're as young as you feel! You will have no trouble learning the PP app you like. Pura Vida.

Papa Joe Loc: Midwest U.S.

Welcome to this wonderful, exciting digital world, Jim. You might give 'Photoscape X' a try. Free and very efficient, but not terribly complicated. (It will say it has expired after so many days of use, but you can continue to use it anyway).

JMCPHD Loc: Maine

Yes I am a psychologist and struggling amateur photographer

AndyH Loc: Massachusetts and New Hampshire

What a bunch of old gaffers!

I feel like a mere kid of 65, and you are all inspirations to me that LR and other PP packages are welll within my reach!

Andy

Brucej67 Loc: Cary, NC

You youngsters never had it so good, what back in my day you took a photo and didn't know what the result looked like till you mixed DK-76 solution into a container that held your film after you loaded it in the dark, then waited the right amt of time for it to develop drained the DK-76 from the container put in the wash cycle and then the fixer, finally dry your film and check it out before putting it in the enlarger to make prints. Talk about chimping that was looking at your processed negatives before printing. 😁 😂 😁 😂 😁 😂