Easily tell great stories with your photos. Powerful yet easy-to-use Adobe® Photoshop® Elements 6 software helps you make your photos look their best with step-by-step editing assistance and amazing compositing capabilities. Share your stories in imagin -

INFURIATING, 03 Oct 2008
This is perhaps the most infuriating software I've ever used. Having had problems with earlier editions, I checked out the available books and bought the top choice with the software. I wish I hadn't bothered. Photoshop crashes most times I use it, throws up all sorts of error messages, despite installing it no less than three times. When it does work, the editor takes about five minutes to load, and the whole package is to me totally counter-intuitive. I'm going straight back to Picasa.

Good, 06 Sep 2008
My photo editor "history" goes like this:

Elements (original - awful, slugged my PC into the ground)
PSP (very good)
PhotoImpact 12 (quite excellent)

I set out to update PhotoImpact to the latest version only to find there isn't one as Corel bought Ulead and have clearly ditched it (nutters!), leaving PSP and Elements as the two mainstream editors. So I decided to become a drone and buy Elements.

What a pleasant surprise, much better than its original version, nice interface, and not much to relearn over the previous one. The Organiser stuff is pretty much bloatware - I think you're much better just having a neat folder system of your own...

Simply fantastic, 27 Aug 2008
If you want to acheive fantastic results with your pictures, Photoshop Elements 6 is for you. At a fairly low price it has fantastic features for making banners, buttons, posters, collages and many more projects. It installed in no time and was easy to register. The only problem that I have is when going from my picture catalogue to the editor, it can take a little longer than expected, but it is still quite quick.

In two words - simply fantastic!

Perfection!, 15 Aug 2008
This software is excellent. I have Windows Vista and this exciting software works just fine. I couldn't be happier with this product. Easy and intuitive and you can pick it up without a manual within minutes.

Wonderful!

adobe 6!, 23 Jul 2008
Bought this a few months ago very difficult to master.
Wanted to transfer raw camera data dynax 5d to tiff or jpeg
wouldn`t transfer to tiff so tried jpeg but there was a problem,the jpeg files were exclusively for web use only so the pics were tiny..
Why cant i buy a simple programme to transfer raw to tiff or jpeg without all these complications?
if u r like me this could prove a dissapoitment!

INFURIATING, 03 Oct 2008
This is perhaps the most infuriating software I've ever used. Having had problems with earlier editions, I checked out the available books and bought the top choice with the software. I wish I hadn't bothered. Photoshop crashes most times I use it, throws up all sorts of error messages, despite installing it no less than three times. When it does work, the editor takes about five minutes to load, and the whole package is to me totally counter-intuitive. I'm going straight back to Picasa.

Good, 06 Sep 2008
My photo editor "history" goes like this:

Elements (original - awful, slugged my PC into the ground)
PSP (very good)
PhotoImpact 12 (quite excellent)

I set out to update PhotoImpact to the latest version only to find there isn't one as Corel bought Ulead and have clearly ditched it (nutters!), leaving PSP and Elements as the two mainstream editors. So I decided to become a drone and buy Elements.

What a pleasant surprise, much better than its original version, nice interface, and not much to relearn over the previous one. The Organiser stuff is pretty much bloatware - I think you're much better just having a neat folder system of your own...

Simply fantastic, 27 Aug 2008
If you want to acheive fantastic results with your pictures, Photoshop Elements 6 is for you. At a fairly low price it has fantastic features for making banners, buttons, posters, collages and many more projects. It installed in no time and was easy to register. The only problem that I have is when going from my picture catalogue to the editor, it can take a little longer than expected, but it is still quite quick.

In two words - simply fantastic!

Perfection!, 15 Aug 2008
This software is excellent. I have Windows Vista and this exciting software works just fine. I couldn't be happier with this product. Easy and intuitive and you can pick it up without a manual within minutes.

Wonderful!

adobe 6!, 23 Jul 2008
Bought this a few months ago very difficult to master.
Wanted to transfer raw camera data dynax 5d to tiff or jpeg
wouldn`t transfer to tiff so tried jpeg but there was a problem,the jpeg files were exclusively for web use only so the pics were tiny..
Why cant i buy a simple programme to transfer raw to tiff or jpeg without all these complications?
if u r like me this could prove a dissapoitment!

A great photo editing package for home users, 06 Sep 2008
Presently on PcPro's `A-List', Adobe Elements is a cut down version of Adobe's £500+ Photoshop/Photoshop Extended CS3, and costs considerably less while still having a lot of useful photo editing capabilities. Photoshop CS3 has a steep learning curve, but not so Photoshop elements. Elements is far more home-user friendly and a lot of the program is geared towards image storage and management of the photos on your hard drive. It also helps you with emailing, web output and scrapbooks of your images. The program auto-downloads your images from the camera to folders, set up using the date, and can even process the images, say automatically removing red-eye, while it does it. Using stacks you can set up image databases [smart albums] using keywords like names, places, events, etc.., and you can even search using visual tags within the image. That said, I shun the image database options offered by Photoshop Elements and Extended, preferring the simplicity of logical folder names instead. Also, like PhotoShop, the image database side isn't seamlessly integrated into the image editing side [to the point where it's actually annoying].

Version 7 of Adobe Photoshop Elements [and the sister video editing Adobe Premiere Elements 7] has now arrived. Elements 7 has a new Quick Fix tool to soften surfaces while keeping the edge and detail sharp. Plus there's a new Scene Cleaner tool that can brush away undesirable objects from a photo [so you can ditch that car or tourists from the view] and there's now a Smart Brush which lets you instantly apply effects to a selected area of the image. Plus Element's 7 sports a new single step `whiten teeth' and `make the sky blue' tool.

Also new in Element's 7 will be a free subscription to Photoshop.com, a special service Adobe has devised to bring friends together by providing quick access to on-line backup, storage, and sharing capabilities. You get 2GB of on-line storage, `enough for up to 1,500 photos', so you can view your photos from virtually anywhere. Thus Photoshop Elements goes `Facebook', allowing you to share your photos `in fun, interactive ways via invitation-only'. For these `Online Albums' you will get new templates delivered to Elements on a regular basis. There will also be a Photoshop.com ` Plus' membership offering 20 Gb [15,000 photos] of on-line photo storage, but that will require you paying an annual fee. The first year's 20 Gb subscription is included in Adobe's `Elements 7 Plus' [but not this standard version].

All the old Elements tools are there as well. For editing you have a set of 'quickfix' options or you can load the full image editor for greater manual control: such as adjust sharpness, correct camera distortion, levels, hue and skin colour. Naturally you have standard tools like crop and adjust image size (pixels) as well. You can now do things like brush away wrinkles with the spot healing/healing brush, use clone overlays, make improved B&W images, add image vibrance and clarity, make composite pictures, copy and even blend parts from different images (to say swap faces from a series of photo's so that all your kids are smiling at the camera in one image). You also get a layers palette for composites, shapes, text effects and frames. Plus there are step-through guides [guided edit] to help you get there. The software will also integrate with scanners twain interfaces if you are into scanning film, and the Fill Light [shadow/highlight] tool is pretty essential for bringing out detail in shadows from any slide/negative scan. Plus Elements can handle RAW camera images, although I use TIFF/jpg (Elements can save in any common image format).

System requirements are quite high: CD drive, 1Gb system RAM, XP or Vista, 2GHz processor, and a Direct-X 9 graphics card [and Adobe installers can reject systems that don't meet the spec]. Elements 7 perhaps isn't a crucial upgrade from Elements 6, but for new home users, or those with older versions, it's very powerful photo editing and image database software from the market leaders. Adobe Elements 7 has only two real competitors at the price: Paint Shop Pro X2 and Serif PhotoPlus X2. Both these programs are also excellent and worthy of consideration, with PhotoPlus's strength being it's about as powerful but rather cheaper to buy and upgrade. Professional users will still head towards Adobe PhotoShop Darkroom 10 and the fantastically expensive Adobe Photoshop CS3 Extended, although even at work we have Adobe Elements on a few imaging workstations for casual users, where the high cost of PhotoShop CS3 Extended simply isn't justified. That said experienced Photoshop CS3 users will find Elements 7 lacking in a few features they are used to.

Adobe Photoshop Elements 7 is also available to buy as a cheaper double pack with the new Adobe Premiere Elements 7 video editing software, which may well be better value than this upgrade. Plus this double pack qualifies for a large educational discount for non-commercial use if you, or a child in the house, are in full time education [from primary school to college]. Similar large educational discounts apply to much of Adobes software.

INFURIATING, 03 Oct 2008
This is perhaps the most infuriating software I've ever used. Having had problems with earlier editions, I checked out the available books and bought the top choice with the software. I wish I hadn't bothered. Photoshop crashes most times I use it, throws up all sorts of error messages, despite installing it no less than three times. When it does work, the editor takes about five minutes to load, and the whole package is to me totally counter-intuitive. I'm going straight back to Picasa.

Good, 06 Sep 2008
My photo editor "history" goes like this:

Elements (original - awful, slugged my PC into the ground)
PSP (very good)
PhotoImpact 12 (quite excellent)

I set out to update PhotoImpact to the latest version only to find there isn't one as Corel bought Ulead and have clearly ditched it (nutters!), leaving PSP and Elements as the two mainstream editors. So I decided to become a drone and buy Elements.

What a pleasant surprise, much better than its original version, nice interface, and not much to relearn over the previous one. The Organiser stuff is pretty much bloatware - I think you're much better just having a neat folder system of your own...

Simply fantastic, 27 Aug 2008
If you want to acheive fantastic results with your pictures, Photoshop Elements 6 is for you. At a fairly low price it has fantastic features for making banners, buttons, posters, collages and many more projects. It installed in no time and was easy to register. The only problem that I have is when going from my picture catalogue to the editor, it can take a little longer than expected, but it is still quite quick.

In two words - simply fantastic!

Perfection!, 15 Aug 2008
This software is excellent. I have Windows Vista and this exciting software works just fine. I couldn't be happier with this product. Easy and intuitive and you can pick it up without a manual within minutes.

Wonderful!

adobe 6!, 23 Jul 2008
Bought this a few months ago very difficult to master.
Wanted to transfer raw camera data dynax 5d to tiff or jpeg
wouldn`t transfer to tiff so tried jpeg but there was a problem,the jpeg files were exclusively for web use only so the pics were tiny..
Why cant i buy a simple programme to transfer raw to tiff or jpeg without all these complications?
if u r like me this could prove a dissapoitment!

A great photo editing package for home users, 06 Sep 2008
Presently on PcPro's `A-List', Adobe Elements is a cut down version of Adobe's £500+ Photoshop/Photoshop Extended CS3, and costs considerably less while still having a lot of useful photo editing capabilities. Photoshop CS3 has a steep learning curve, but not so Photoshop elements. Elements is far more home-user friendly and a lot of the program is geared towards image storage and management of the photos on your hard drive. It also helps you with emailing, web output and scrapbooks of your images. The program auto-downloads your images from the camera to folders, set up using the date, and can even process the images, say automatically removing red-eye, while it does it. Using stacks you can set up image databases [smart albums] using keywords like names, places, events, etc.., and you can even search using visual tags within the image. That said, I shun the image database options offered by Photoshop Elements and Extended, preferring the simplicity of logical folder names instead. Also, like PhotoShop, the image database side isn't seamlessly integrated into the image editing side [to the point where it's actually annoying].

Version 7 of Adobe Photoshop Elements [and the sister video editing Adobe Premiere Elements 7] has now arrived. Elements 7 has a new Quick Fix tool to soften surfaces while keeping the edge and detail sharp. Plus there's a new Scene Cleaner tool that can brush away undesirable objects from a photo [so you can ditch that car or tourists from the view] and there's now a Smart Brush which lets you instantly apply effects to a selected area of the image. Plus Element's 7 sports a new single step `whiten teeth' and `make the sky blue' tool.

Also new in Element's 7 will be a free subscription to Photoshop.com, a special service Adobe has devised to bring friends together by providing quick access to on-line backup, storage, and sharing capabilities. You get 2GB of on-line storage, `enough for up to 1,500 photos', so you can view your photos from virtually anywhere. Thus Photoshop Elements goes `Facebook', allowing you to share your photos `in fun, interactive ways via invitation-only'. For these `Online Albums' you will get new templates delivered to Elements on a regular basis. There will also be a Photoshop.com ` Plus' membership offering 20 Gb [15,000 photos] of on-line photo storage, but that will require you paying an annual fee. The first year's 20 Gb subscription is included in Adobe's `Elements 7 Plus' [but not this standard version].

All the old Elements tools are there as well. For editing you have a set of 'quickfix' options or you can load the full image editor for greater manual control: such as adjust sharpness, correct camera distortion, levels, hue and skin colour. Naturally you have standard tools like crop and adjust image size (pixels) as well. You can now do things like brush away wrinkles with the spot healing/healing brush, use clone overlays, make improved B&W images, add image vibrance and clarity, make composite pictures, copy and even blend parts from different images (to say swap faces from a series of photo's so that all your kids are smiling at the camera in one image). You also get a layers palette for composites, shapes, text effects and frames. Plus there are step-through guides [guided edit] to help you get there. The software will also integrate with scanners twain interfaces if you are into scanning film, and the Fill Light [shadow/highlight] tool is pretty essential for bringing out detail in shadows from any slide/negative scan. Plus Elements can handle RAW camera images, although I use TIFF/jpg (Elements can save in any common image format).

System requirements are quite high: CD drive, 1Gb system RAM, XP or Vista, 2GHz processor, and a Direct-X 9 graphics card [and Adobe installers can reject systems that don't meet the spec]. Elements 7 perhaps isn't a crucial upgrade from Elements 6, but for new home users, or those with older versions, it's very powerful photo editing and image database software from the market leaders. Adobe Elements 7 has only two real competitors at the price: Paint Shop Pro X2 and Serif PhotoPlus X2. Both these programs are also excellent and worthy of consideration, with PhotoPlus's strength being it's about as powerful but rather cheaper to buy and upgrade. Professional users will still head towards Adobe PhotoShop Darkroom 10 and the fantastically expensive Adobe Photoshop CS3 Extended, although even at work we have Adobe Elements on a few imaging workstations for casual users, where the high cost of PhotoShop CS3 Extended simply isn't justified. That said experienced Photoshop CS3 users will find Elements 7 lacking in a few features they are used to.

Adobe Photoshop Elements 7 is also available to buy as a cheaper double pack with the new Adobe Premiere Elements 7 video editing software, which may well be better value than this upgrade. Plus this double pack qualifies for a large educational discount for non-commercial use if you, or a child in the house, are in full time education [from primary school to college]. Similar large educational discounts apply to much of Adobes software.

Good upgrade, but maybe not so compelling, 23 Sep 2008
I've used Photoshop for years, and although Adobe are pushing this as their biggest update yet, I don't agree. From beta testing reviews, there are some gorgeous new features, like GPU acceleration for some things, and context-sensitive resizing, but I gather most of the update has happened behind the scenes and the user won't see as much new as they may be expecting.

I would shop around, too. Photoshop Extended CS4 is only £887.12 (full, not upgrade) from Adobe's own UK store, and Amazon are trying to sell it for almost a grand!

If you have an old copy, you would do well on the upgrade pricing.