I am in the process of buying a Macbook and was wondering which software is the best editing software
aperture and elements are 2 differnet types of editing... you can't compare them.. you can compare aperture to lightroom (lightroom is better IMO) but you can't compare aperture to elements.. i would suggest getting both (cept i'd get light room, not aperture) i use lightroom for basic color touch up and cataloging my images, and photoshop cs3 for the more detailed edits and cuts.
isn't aperture a RAW converter and a software to organise your images? So it is quite a different thing from photoshop. aperture and lightroom are the same type of software, but photoshop has a different purpose.
theres actually a free trial you can download off of apples website, i use aperture 2 and really like it.
Apple Aperture, Capture One, Adobe lightroom are geared towards processing of RAW files straight from digital camera. They are geared towards the photographer by providing tools for photo adjustments (saturation, curves, contrast, white balance etc...) as well as cataloging capabilities to keep track of photographs. Photoshop Elements, CS, GIMP, Paint shop are geared towards the manipulation of digital images. You can brush, air brush, layer, mask, etc... these are generally geared towards the graphic artists. WIth that said... it is common to see both RAW converters and photo editing software leveraged in a single workflow. In fact, most photographers I know, will do 90% of their work in a RAW converter (like Adobe Lightroom) and their final tweaks/adjustments in an editor like Adobe Photoshop.
As already stated, lightroom and photoshop are different tools. Adobe's FAQ has a pretty good explanation: Adobe Photoshop CS3 software is the industry standard in digital image editing. Photoshop holds an important place in the pro photographers toolbox, for detailed pixel-level editing and compositing, but photographers face a variety of workflow concerns beyond image editing. Lightroom addresses these needs in a photographer-centric way. Each module in Lightroom is dedicated to an essential photographic taskthe Library for importing and managing photos; the Develop module for processing even hundreds of photographs at a time; the Slideshow, Web and Print modules to easily present photos on your screen, online, or in print. Lightroom also goes further in allowing you to manage raw files even if they are offline, with automatic importing from the folder on your computer used for tethered shooting.
