I agree, photoshop is king, however, you can't IMHO have "fun" with photoshop. You have to LEARN photoshop. It's not just clicking away and presto, your photo looks "da bomb."

I remember the first time I sat down with photoshop. It might as well have been in Japanese. I didn't know how anything worked. All I did was dick around with the filters.

Photoshop takes dedication. For fun, get something free like Gimp or Picasa.

 

I would have to disagree some on this, I think photoshop can be a lot of fun to sit down with, especially if you are a gadget type person. It has been a while since I did a fresh install, but I remember there used to be some tutorials that installed with photoshop a long time ago, if not anymore, there is a wealth of tutorials online to get you up to speed quickly.

Of course this is coming from the perspective of a person who started using photoshop for graphic arts as well as photo editing and had someone show me the basics.

However the price of a legal copy is most prohibitive for someone who just wants to have fun with it.

 

Tutorial=Learning.

 

True true, but for me I had fun as soon as I found the brush tool and color pallet.

Plus who said filters aren't fun? Just look as all the images posted on the web.