What can you do with photo editing software?

Microsoft Picture-It, (free with XP?): Pretty limited, but good for simple tasks.

Make sure that the software (and the drivers for the camera), are compatible with your own computer. If you are running Windows 95 or a Macintosh, you are likely to have a more difficult time finding a camera and software that will work with your computer. Windows 98 is OK, Windows 2000 and XP work well also.

What can you do with photo editing software?

Most of the time photo editing is about sharing. Fix the red-eye, the contrast and crop the photo before you email it. Another fun thing is to build story pictures or panoramas of places to which you travel. Once and a while you can tackle a very interesting graphic problem, as with this example:

I got a call from a friend. It seems that she wanted a person removed from a photo.

The picture on the left had five friends together after a wedding, but an in-law had jumped into the shot. “Could you remove Mom?” asked my friend. She offered the picture on the right for additional raw material.

It took 1.5 hours with Photoshop Elements to come up with the solution. I teach this to all my students in my eight week course.