Elements Vs. iPhoto

By David Peters

Adobe Photoshop Elements, as the name suggests is in the product line of Adobe and is picture editing program. iPhoto is from Apple Inc. and is for Mac OS. This also is a picture organizing program.

Adobe Photoshop Elements and iPhoto are not similar programs though they share a few common features like the photo organizer, basic colour correction and picture correction features.

iPhoto is actually a photo organizer but Adobe Elements is much more advanced and is an image editing software itself. Moving through the huge album of images and making corrections to them is far easier in Photoshop Elements than in iPhoto. Using Elements, you can composite the various images you've and combine them to form one, or convert it to a completely new one. If you just wish to do the basic image correction tasks, then iPhoto is useful. You can even use Elements and iPhoto together. In this case, using Adobe Elements as your editor will be a better choice. You can import the pictures into iPhoto and edit it using Elements. For this you will have to set the option to 'Edit' in External Editor in the iPhoto menu. iPhoto isn't that a professional tool for editing your images. And if you're an expert working with editing photos, Adobe Photoshop Elements is the correct choice.

Adobe Photoshop Elements has much more editing options that iPhoto as it's an editing program and iPhoto has more organizing options. The organizing features of iPhoto are keywords and non destructive editing. It's simple to use books and calendars in iPhoto. While the benefit of using Elements is that there are three ways of editing photos. The newest in the line, Photoshop Elements 10 for Mac stands up to the expectations of the users. It is aimed at both specialist as well as amateur users. And it is possible to use iPhoto along with Photoshop Elements 10. Nowadays in some packages you may buy the iPhoto with the Adobe Elements. In the package charge, you'll find that iPhoto is provided absolutely free. This package can include Adobe Bridge and a raw picture converter also.

Besides editing images, Photoshop Elements provide lots of options in adding effects to the images. This is not possible in iPhoto. Along with Adobe Photoshop Elements comes the Bridge which aids you to assign the meta-data keywords to the images. In iPhoto you can add just the proprietary keywords. Using Adobe Elements, besides organizing your images, you can also share it by creating scrapbooks, web based albums, and in many more creative ways. Another disadvantage of iPhoto is that when you begin using it, it often changes the folder structures you've created.

Also you cannot use Adobe Bridge and iPhoto together on the same pictures. This is as the keywords and the metadata of the photos crash the iPhoto when viewing these pictures using the program. And when you export the photos from the iPhoto, the program writes the keywords and titles corresponding to the photos in the respective IPTC fields.

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