Choosing the right program...

[bozena]

I am ready to invest in a new software for my scrapbooking. I'm pretty new at this by I enjoy it a lot. I'm looking for some advise on what is the optimal for someone like me...Should I go with PSE, CS3, orPSP... Please help me make the decision. Thanks!

[mosser77]

I haven't used anything but PSE, but I love it. I think it is a good program for beginners. The learning curve isn't huge and it's not overwhelming. The only thing I wish I could do is text on a path, but Andrea can hook us up with text path templates :)

[babyofmine]

I agree that PSE is a great value! My friend only paid $80 for her program (I won mine! lol), and you can usually find it for less on sale.
I had used Picture It Express and Picture It Publisher before, as well as a very simple program (it didn't even do shadows, ugh!) and I have even tried GIMP (never could understand that one!).
By far, PSE does the most with the smallest learning curve.

[britnkaysmemaw2]

Originally Posted by bozena

I am ready to invest in a new software for my scrapbooking. I'm pretty new at this by I enjoy it a lot. I'm looking for some advise on what is the optimal for someone like me...Should I go with PSE, CS3, orPSP... Please help me make the decision. Thanks!

Great question. I wonder if anyone can tell us the difference between PSE 3 and Photoshop 7. I have both programs, and have just started learning PSE 3. Don't want to overwhelm myself by trying to learn 2 programs. Is there much difference between these two?

[bozena]

Thanks ladies, I will have to give it a try.

[TammyM]

I purchased PSE and ended up purchasing Photoshop CS3. A large portion of the tutorials available online are in CS3 and I got very frustrated not being able to do all the cool things they described. Also, CS3 is really the creme of the crop as far a capabilities and add-ons, etc.

I do agree that the learning curve for PSE is much lower and the program is more intuitive.

Just thought I'd chime in since I own both of the latest versions.

[twirlyjoy]

I absolutely LOVE PSP. Have tried PSCS but it is such a big learning curve that I have uninstalled it as I can do everything I want to as far as scrapping and even designing goes in PSP! I have to say that as much as PSE is similar, I HAVE to be able to do text on a path, which PSP does do.

[bozena]

Thanks for all the info...

[tweederbug]

Just like pp have said .. many different programs let you do what different things. I have PSP,PSCS,PSCS2 and PSCS3 and I like PSCS2 the best. I am still thinking about just starting to use my PSCS3 because I heard that I could use my jpeg photos and do them with RAW...which I didn't know. I am just afraid of this program and the disk sits in our safe LOL!!

[linder]

In my experience, most of the tutorials for scrapping techniques written for CS3also apply to PSE, so you get the benefit of training materials written for both programs. And if you start with PSE and later decide that you want to move up to CS3, it will be easier to learn because so much of PSE and CS is identical.

Good luck!