Need help picking editing software

I don't have much money and I need to get editing software. What is the best bang for the buck.

Well, what would you say your budget is? For less than $100 USD, Photoshop Elements packs a whole lot of power.

For free, there are apps like Picasa by Google, or the much more sophisticated but complicated Gimp.

And then there are plenty more scattered around, some that cost, some not.

Elements does have a 30 day free trial -- you will want to do some reading up on it or any software you get.

I've heard GIMP was pretty good. I haven't tried it myself personally. Free is a pretty darn good price to me!

I would also like to be able to do hdr.

For HDR, Oloneo has a free (for now) beta that's pretty cool, and I've played a little with Picturenaut and it's free.

Photoshop Elements is great, if you go with Photoshop go to kellbytraining.com it cost you 24 month.

Paint Shop Pro X3 is very capable and it'll do HDR. About the same price as Photoshop Elements. I've seen it from time to time at $49 on sale.

-js