Best photo editors and organizers for OS X

You probably think that Photoshop is the greatest image editor of all time, but prepare to be proven wrong. I agree that Photoshop is more popular and it is the most used image editor but there has been a test, with 4 other application, that prove something else.

So, the applications on test are the Adobe Photoshop Elements 9 (67 pounds), Adobe Photoshop CS5 (658 pounds), Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3.3 (238 pounds), Apple iPhoto (free or 9 pounds), Apple Aperture 3.1 (173 pounds)

Let us begin with the first test:

1.Picture management

Photoshop has Adobe Bridge, this has hidden depths, meaning that it can sort photos using keywords or metadata.

iPhoto is fast and simple but it doesn’t offer stacking tools like Photoshop. iPhoto stores your images into an internal filling system.

Photoshop Elements Organizer is new on the market, it can offer you more transparent control, and it works with your existing filing system.

Aperture and Lightroom are better. For example Aperture can’t be beaten when it comes to speed, interface and flexibility

2. Photo editing

iPhoto comes in handy at everyday image fixes and it’s a lot of fun, but that’s it for this application.

Lightroom and Aperture are professional applications and there is no surprise when it comes to their editing tools. Aperture looks great but Lightroom has the new lens correction profile.

Elements works approximately like Photoshop, especially version 9, but still Photoshop is the leader in this test.

3. Ease of use

In this test is harder to choose a winner because all the applications encounter some problems.

iPhoto is the easiest to use but it has some things that could bug you. Despite being the latest version it has some problems with the geotagging /mapping tools.

Photoshop is the technical one while Elements is better: it helps you to much and in the end is a bit confusing.

Aperture and Lightroom are the professional applications and it doesn’t take you too much to learn the basics. Aperture is the flexible one and the Lightroom is faster.

4. Value for money

So we have the most expensive application Photoshop which to be honest it doesn’t do much more than the Elements. Actually, if you think about it, Elements has the Organizer application which is a lot better than Photoshop.

Aperture and Lightroom are also expensive but both have great applications. In my opinion Aperture is the best because is a lot cheaper.

Elements in iPhoto are the cheapest, in fact iPhoto might cost you nothing, but they lack depth.

So if you are looking for an image editor Aperture Lightroom and Elements 9 is the way to go.

Of course, you want to find out who won the test. Well, we were looking for the program that had the best editing tools and the all round combination of photo. So the winner is definitely Elements 9.

If you are looking for the image editor than go out and buy Elements 9. You surely won’t regret it.