Recently in Software Category

Before I discovered Lightroom I opened every image in Photoshop, closed the ones I didn't like, and adjusted the ones I did. I got pretty good at it and I had macros to do things like create jpegs for use on the web. Lightroom changed all that and introduced me to a much faster and more efficient process.

Lightroom takes a workflow approach that is quite different from traditional image editing software. Once you have imported your images into Lightroom, you can use it to select and/or rate your images, perform adjustments like cropping, levels, and minor retouching, and output the images to various file formats, a printer, or web galleries. While Lightroom has many great features, I love it because it is easy to use, very flexible and completely non-destructive.  It also cut my postprocessing time by more than half.

Adobe Photoshop has long been the defacto standard for professional photographers and serious amateurs alike. Adobe recently released Photoshop CS4, and it includes some great new features.

Ken writes,

"What program or programs are recommended for captioning digital photos? I want to be able to choose the location of the caption, the font, and the colour of the text."

Most photo editing packages allow you to add text to your images. I seldom add captions to photos (and SmugMug automatically watermarks my uploaded images for me there), but when I do I usually just add a text layer in Adobe Photoshop. I just checked Photoshop Elements 6, and it supports text layers as well. Just click on the "T" in the toolbar, click on the image,and it will create the layer for you.

Many companies have downloadable trial versions online. For example, you can download Adobe Photoshop Elements 6 here and see if it meets your needs.

Does the software that came with your scanner suck?  Is your expensive Nikon film scanner sitting on the shelf because you bought a new computer or upgraded to the latest Windows operating system only to find out that Nikon is still in the dark ages?