While I know many moms who would love a brand new SLR, multi-lens camera for Mother’s Day, it’s not always in the budget. But there is a way to make your current pictures look even better – Adobe’s Phototshop Elements. With more features and control than iPhoto without being as intimidating as the regular Photoshop program, Elements 8 gives you the ability to take ordinary pictures and make them extraordinary. The program allows you to easily organize, edit, create and share your photo memories.
Let me say this – it’s not for photo editing novices. If you’ve never as much as adjusted the brightness of one of your pictures or erased a blemish or stain, Elements might be a bit of a features overload. Some of the new features for Version 8 include Photomerge that allows you to merge the best faces from multiple pictures to create a photo where everyone is smiling (holiday cards just got a lot easier). You can also use Photomerge to combine photo exposures (great for nighttime photos) and scenery in order to eliminate that guy who rode his bike right through your perfect shot of your grandpa juggling oranges at the farmer’s market. You can adjust every facet imaginable with Elements’ controls and give your photos cool effects. I’ve only had a few days to play around with it and know that I’ve just barely scraped the surface of it’s capabilities, but here are a few peeks at what I learned.
See how I was able to remove that unsightly wood post and light at the bottom? I cropped out the skylights in the background, and since we were visiting this old fort, I thought an aged sepia tone would add to the mood. Adorable husband and offspring, untouched.
Here’s another little adjustment sample. Pictures of your kids sleeping are just too hard to pass up, and while they are adorable, sometimes a little help makes them extra angelic.
Plus, after you’ve whitened teeth, removed red-eye, lightened the background, enhanced that sunset, erased that stranger and add a cool border, Elements allows you to make dozens of fun photo gifts. The option to personalize photobooks, greeting cards, prints, collages, slideshows and online galleries are endless.
TRY IT FREE! You can try Photoshop Elements for FREE for 30-days by clicking here.
MOTHER’S DAY SPECIAL! Through May 10, Photoshop Elements 8 is available for as low as $69.99 (a $30 savings!), and a bundle package with Adobe’s Premiere Elements 8 video-editing software as low as $99.99 – up to a $50 savings. More promo info is available at www.adobe.com/go/psepre_bundle.
WIN IT! Win your own copy of Photoshop Elements 8 & Premiere Elements 8 Bundle through Adobe’s Twitter giveaway. To enter, tweet a picture of any (past or present) Mother’s Day gift you’ve made to @AdobeElements (include#PSEGift hash tag).
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Note: Sample of program was sent for this review.
