I know it’s a bit off topic, but I recently purchased Adobe’s new Elements for my Mac. However, I think a review is appropriate. Possessing a cameraphone like the Nokia N95 or the Nokia N82 that can take 5 megapixel pictures and not having a decent program to correct some of the “faults”, either by the user, phone, or situation, is unacceptable. Why shoot pictures without being able to make them even more beautiful? View more after the jump

What’s in the Box?

Adobe gives you the option of either purchasing the Disc and doing a “manual” download or via downloading the program itself from Adobe. I went with the box rout since It would’ve taken a tad bit longer over the interweb.

Anyway, the box itself is minimal. As you can see, it comes with the disc, some rebate and registering forms and a useless little manual. As usual, Adobe packs in a ton of features in it’s software but they never provide the customer with an appropriate manual. In my case, it’s not a problem, I love exploring.

Many people think that this is just a watered down version of CS3. Well, if that was your opinion, you’d be wrong. Elements 6 is a full featured program geared more towards users who wouldn’t be considered novices nor experts by any means. I myself had the beta version of CS3 and it was a tad bit much to my liking. Unless you’re a professional photographer and who is dependent on great photos in order to eat, this is a solid program for you.

Sample Edits

Here is the welcome screen where you have the option to choose where you can import pictures from.

Here is a simple photo I took of Mark the other day.

Well, I decided to show a simple little edit that will turn Mark’s boring background into a more interesting white and black-distorted background.

A quick little 2 minute edit using the Quick Selection Tool to isolate his background. The I chose to use a filter called “Bas Relief” to make it look like the following:

… or how about a different look?

Final Thoughts

My advice is to purchase the program and start experimenting with the different edit options. Sooner or later, you’ll get used to it. Even though it just came out, there are some web guides out there.

It costs around $99 to purchase, but I think it’s worth it. It is a great complement to your Nseries cameraphones. Please believe that when I say it’s worth every penny, IT IS.