[leelicini]

This is a very informative thread for a newbie who loves taking shots of children and babies (I have 2 of my very own models). I only own an advanced point and shoot at this time, I wonder if any of the software above would be useful to me.

[Dabhand16]

There is lots of software to choose from. Some is freely available by downloads, and others are availabe on CD.

Software ranges from basic to advanced, and, of course, gets more expensive as you go up the scale.

The most popular is probably Adobe Photoshop Elements, now in version 5. Because it is so popular, there are lots of tutorials available for it on DVD. Corel produce Paint Shop Pro, which is also very good, but there are not so many tutorials around.

There are books available for both Elements and Paint Shop Pro, but most people find the video tutorials are good because you can see what the various techniques do, as well as seeing how to do them. Once you are familiar with the software, the books are more useful, and you don't need to use a TV or computer to look at them.

The free ones tend not to have DVD or book support, but can have on-line tutorials or forums.

Most digital cameras will also have some software supplied, but again it might not be very well supported, depending on what the camera makers include.

I think that editing software is very useful for anyone with a digital camera, but you need to do a bit of research to see what will suit your needs. You do not have to use everything it can do straight away, and you don't want to find that it will not do everything you want as you get more proficient.

I suggest you look at what is available, and perhaps shortlist a couple of programs then post a question in the computer software forum to get more detailed advice.