[bluestringer]

Faststone works great. Fast and free. I also have Corel Aftershot Pro, got the download for only 12 bucks. But I use Faststone more, seems to be better than Aftershot Pro.

[Miguel]

Sir.. I have over 50+ years of film developing, post processing and photo sales through galleries so I too have a bit of knowledge, I do take exception to the choice of verbiage in your post directed at mine. Given this type of posted attitude towards another posters suggestions, as a newer member I do not know if I care to continue to be a part of this online Pentaxian community. I would expect this from a canikon not a pentaxian.

Adios

I apologize if I offended. That was not my intention.

Please note however, that I did not call you out by name, nor make any disparaging comments about anyone, but merely stated a different opinion that intentionally was what I perceived from my experience. Surely you believe that I too am entitled to an opinion, even if it differs with yours? Many topics in this and zillions of other photography forums entail people stating opinions different from those prior. I don't think camera brand ownership has any correlation with online writing skills or interpersonal sensitivity.

M

[Kerrowdown]

Another vote here for Lightroom.

[jatrax]

If you want to do graphics and mess around with layers and be artsy and creative get Photoshop, learn it well, and keep going.

If you just want to process pictures and improve them a bit, there are many different programs that will work, many people use a combination of different programs to get what they want done. Possibly because they started with a particular program and spent time learning it so they stick with it even if they have to use another program (or several) to get the whole job done.

But if you do not have any bias due to prior experience just get Lightroom and learn to use it. It will do just about anything you could want to do with a photograph and if there is something it doesn't do there is a plugin that will. There are individual programs that are better at specific functions (like noise reduction for example) but nothing I have tried does all the parts as good as Lightroom.

You don't sound like you want to spent a lot of time on the computer and Lightroom excels at that, IF you take the time to learn it and set it up properly. The key to LR is presets and templates. Figure out what you want done to your images set that as a preset, assign the preset to be applied at import and 80% of your work is done at import. Then you can spend additional time on those images that deserve the attention.

There is a learning curve, and honestly the first week I was feeling totally lost but once you figure it out it can be quite automated.

Of course one of the biggest functions of LR is cataloging, keywording and retrieval of images. If you have no interest in those functions then there are cheaper and less complicated programs. But if you take a good number of images and have any desire to actually find a particular image 5 years from now then you should be keywording and organizing.

[Oldbayrunner]

I apologize if I offended. That was not my intention.

Please note however, that I did not call you out by name, nor make any disparaging comments about anyone, but merely stated a different opinion that intentionally was what I perceived from my experience. Surely you believe that I too am entitled to an opinion, even if it differs with yours? Many topics in this and zillions of other photography forums entail people stating opinions different from those prior. I don't think camera brand ownership has any correlation with online writing skills or interpersonal sensitivity.

M

Considering mine was the only above post that suggested he first use the software that came with his camera there was no need to name. Giving your opinion of the software without reference to another's post would have been sufficient. At no time in my years of forum posting, out of courtesy to my fellow members have I ever directed my comment referencing another's post. I simply have posted my opinion as to what I thought without reference.

Enjoy your forum, I don't need it.

[twitch]

Chopping and Changing PP software makes it likely you will lose images, or at the very least lose track of where your images are. That's why I'd suggest just going LR from the get go, speaking from experience here.

[lenorehig]

Thank you everyone for your comments and suggestions.

[sergeremy]

I'm pretty new to post-processing too. I've been shooting raws for about two months now, and was doing very basic processing of jpegs in GIMP previously.

I'm moving away from Linux however, and happened upon Sagelight browsing the web (I may have found out about it here actually) and went for it, as it was cheaper than Lightroom.

To me Sagelight is very intuitive, and the layout does not tire my eyes (as did RawTherapee and Lightzone which I tried in Linux). I don't use it for effects, although it has a few interesting ones, just for adjustments in light, density and color. I'm happy with its processing capabilities, but wish it had a cataloging feature.

Oh, and once you've processed, you save your image as a TIFF or Jpeg (your RAW file is untouched of course) - and can't go back on your choices.

I may move on to Lightroom at some point (I'm on windows Vista which can't handle LR5), but for now I'm learning SL, and am quite satisfied.

[DogLover]

I broke down and bought a Lightroom book. In theory the program is simple to use, but the book is 700 pages.

I have found Scott Kelby's books on LR to be pretty good. Pretty easy to find how to do something specific. His popularity is showing, though, as his books continue to climb in price.

[frogoutofwater]

I have found Scott Kelby's books on LR to be pretty good. Pretty easy to find how to do something specific. His popularity is showing, though, as his books continue to climb in price.

Another vote for Lightroom and also for Kelby's books. I must admit that I find his writing style a bit irritating, but his recent LR and PS books seem well-organized to me, and I find that I can dip into them to learn a couple of discrete topics and then apply them to my images fairly quickly. Then I go back and pick up a few more techniques.

Even spending a 3-5 minutes editing an image that you've selected as a pick can make significant improvements in the image - I find it's worth the time.

[OrchidJulie]

Considering mine was the only above post that suggested he first use the software that came with his camera there was no need to name. Giving your opinion of the software without reference to another's post would have been sufficient. At no time in my years of forum posting, out of courtesy to my fellow members have I ever directed my comment referencing another's post. I simply have posted my opinion as to what I thought without reference.

Enjoy your forum, I don't need it.

I hope you'll reconsider, I'm sure we can learn from your experience.

[lenorehig]

Thanks again for all the helpful suggestions and input. I think my choices narrow down to Lightroom or Elements. I have read the first of Kelby's books on Digital Photography and agree that he is a valuable resource. If his book on Lightroom is recommended, maybe that should be the direction I take. Thank you all again for helping in the decision! I like the comment "Pick one, learn it and stick with it".

[SpecialK]

I too have used the Pentax software which hangs up frequently with a few hundred files, does not remember the custom window layout, has much wasted white-space on the screen, and the v3.51 I started with had no healing tool to even clone out dust, etc. Maybe it does now, but too late. I'm on v4.3 something that was supposed to be more stable - not. I do use it for the exif list and file handling.

[Just1MoreDave]

The K-30 Pentax software is something different. I have used the Digital Camera Utility 4.something. It has some unique features, like the ability to take a RAW shot and apply all of the in-camera presets to it. It sure doesn't like opening a folder with more than a handful of shots.

The Lightroom book I got is by Martin Evening. It's the opposite style of Scott Kelby, a very comprehensive look at every feature, often how and why the sliders work a particular way, and no jokes. There may be more detail than anyone ever needs but you don't have to read it all. Kelby explains well but if he thinks you don't need a feature or a second/third/tenth way to do something, he may just skip it.

[todd]

I understand why LR gets many votes. I have used it in the past (betas and trials), enough to know that as a hobbyist, I do not "need" it and imho I do fine without it. With the last beta (version 5) I spent a lot of time during the duration of that beta comparing my results with work I did with my prefered freeware and open source apps. Sometimes I got better results with LR, and sometimes better (for my subjective taste) with the other apps. The main advantage of LR is it's batch and archiving abilities, which I purposely avoided because I didn't want to get hooked. I also really like its lens and distortion correction abilities. If you have the money to burn, then LR will get the job done. If you don't, or don't want to burn it right now, then especially because you are software literate, I would say there are some very capable free/open source apps you could check out. The (Windows) apps I use (often in combination) are Rawtherapee, Gimp(+G'mic), Lightzone, LuminanceHDR, Delaboratory, Irfanview, and XNView. As far as Twitch's comment about losing track of images, I am not sure it would be better for me with LR. I store my shots by dated folders with descriptive folder names after the dates when I bring them in, and that is good enough for me...