The ability to take and store hundreds of digital photos, with virtually no fear of running out of film or being overwhelmed by printing costs, arms the picture happy masses with the ability to run rampant capturing images of everything in our field of vision. Managing those shots, improving the images, making slideshows, resizing photos to be used in projects or sent via email requires a set of tools we never expected in pre-digital photo days.
Two major classes of software applications have emerged to assist in photo editing and management. Editing suites, which include filters, color leveling, image scrubbing, color correction, background removal, and a multitude of other features, represent the class of image manipulation tools aimed at people who are serious about fixing their images. The Cadillac of this first class of tools is Photoshop, which you can read all about at in the Photoshop Reference Guide. The second class of photo tools, photo organizers, offers barebones tools for fixing photos and piles on the features for creating albums, adding metadata for searching photos, and generally makes image management easier. A few apps do both, or throw in a photo management tool when you buy the editing suite.
Depending on the amount of control you need over your photos, the tools you require may vary greatly. For most users, being able to keep photos organized, remove red-eye, touch up colors, and resize images are probably the bare essentials. Every one of the apps in this category will automatically recognize a camera and import images, so that feature should be considered ubiquitous.
