Hey everyone!
I have really bad timing to be asking this because I'm having back surgery Monday morning, and who knows when I'll be back online to see your responses, But, I'd really appreciate your input AND PRAYERS...THANKS!
I have the full edition of PSE 2. I've had it for a long time, but couldn't quite get into it. I then purchased DIP 9 (I think---anyway, it's the latest version). I've done a couple of pages in it, but nothing major. I feel like there's a lot more stuff out there for the PSE. I was going to get PSE 4 as a Christmas gift to myself, but I wasn't sure if there was enough of a difference between 3 and 4 to justify the large difference in $$$. Could you talented PSE people tell me if you feel the differences are worth it (between 3 and 4) or are there not even that many differences between 2 and 4? Also, do you agree that I would enjoy the increased versatility and number of users with PSE to validate the change from DIP?
I hope this makes sense, and ya'll can bear with me. I'm SO nervous about this morning!!!!
Thanks,
Laura

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Laura

I don't know anything about DIP so I couldn't really answer you there, and I know there are some DIP users that are totally happy with that program.
But I started out with PSE 1, moved quickly to PSE 3 last Christmas (as a present). It took a month before I felt really comfortable working with the program. It just isn't intuitive! But after that month I felt like I had the hang of it and was churning out LOs. Now PSE 4 I hear has a few new additions that I think are worth it. First when you chose a font it shows the font in its own font so you can see what it looks like. Which was one of our complaints to adobe about PSE. You had to use another program to view the fonts, which was irritating at times. And the second big thing is the text boxes. Now you can create a text box and it will keep your text within that box. In PSE 3 you had to hit return and space the journalling yourself, or use another program for the text. So for just these two things, I would get 4 over 3. I'm sure there are a couple more differences between the two, like some more auto correct features etc. But these are the 2 that jump out at me. I would buy the upgrade to PSE4 myself, except I just bought the upgrade to PSCS2! And yet I still 99% of the time use PSE3. There are lots of tutorials for PSE and a lot of brushes and add ons that you can download for free. I think it and PS are just the mainstream programs. You probably could find a lot of stuff for DIP too, but just have to look a little harder.

Hope that helps!

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I always welcome cc of my LOs!! My work is like me- in progress!

My Gallery

Try downloading a trial version of PSE 4 to see if you like it. I am a diehard DIP user and find it so easy to use. I just bought PSE 4 because like you, I wanted to try something a little more challenging. Challenging it is! After Christmas it will be tutorial/learning time.
You don't have to change from DIP to PSE....just use both.

Good luck on your surgery!

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Please visit my gallery http://www.scrapbook-bytes.com/galle...00&ppuser=3110

I started with PSE2, and upgraded to PSE3. I have not upgraded to PSE4, so have no first-hand experience with that program.

Here is a site that will give you an excellent review, with pictures, of the differences between PSE2 and PSE3. http://www.northlite.net/review/elem3.htm
This is well worth reading although it does not review PSE4.

I have a hand-out on PSE4. Here are some of the features that are mentioned:
1. "Face Tagging" .. an option that will search for faces in your photos & tag those photos automatically.
2. "Magic Selection Brush" in quick fix allows you to adjust just one area of a photo
3. "Magic Extractor" allows you to easily move a person from one photo to another photo
4. Automated skin tone adjustment in Standard Edit
5. Improvements to working with text including paragraph text and a WYSIWYG font menu (where the text is displayed in the typeface)
6. Photo Mail feature automatically creased the emails so you don't have to worry about things like attachments
7. One-click online printing
8. added features to the slide show including pan & zoom, graphics, music & voice narration.
9. not necessary to link layers to move or transform them
10. Select similar images -- ex: to change fonts on all similar images at same time, or add style such as drop shadows to all similar images at same time
11. Improvements to Organizer include folder view, face tagging, improved stacks & versions, improved creation tools
12. De-fringe layer is an adjustment to help smooth out rough jagged edges after cutting an object & pasting to new background or layer
13. Text blocks are now available
14. Automatically corrects red-eye as photo is loaded.

Hope this info will help you make the decision that is right for you.

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Pat
Memory Box Artist