Both Photoshop Elements and Premiere Elements have always been regarded as the lite versions of their more full featured namesakes, but they have a definite place in the Adobe canon simply because they do similar jobs to Photoshop and Premiere for pros, albeit in a far more user friendly manner.

It's the first time the bundle has been available for the Mac, perhaps Adobe's acknowledgement that the OSX platform is as much a consumer as a pro operating system today.

As an example of the consumer focus, the suite contains the means to share your work on Flickr, YouTube and other social networking media platforms in just a few clicks. Using the full versions of each to do similar things would call for specialist technical knowledge in things like file formats and codecs consumers can't usually be bothered with. 

Manipulating photos or video is done in a similar way to the expanded toolsets of Photoshop and the timeline in Premiere, but if you don't want to go that deep several tabs in the Organiser window (Organiser is like a pared-back version of Adobe Bridge) give you macro or one-click control over your edits.

Even when you delve into the finer control like the Premiere timeline, it keeps technicalities at arms length. As you drag content onto the timeline - whether HD, SD and in any number of codecs - the software repurposes it all as you drag and drop so it doesn't interrupt your creative flow or ask you a bunch of technical questions you're not interested in.

Both programs put as much control as you want in front of you if you want it. But where Photoshop or Premiere Pro is like a kitchen full of arcane utensils that are no good unless you're a trained chef, the Elements series is like having a trained chef there to lead you through everything.

Adobe Photoshop Elements 9/Adobe Premiere Elements 9

$249

See www.adobe.com.au

By Drew Turney

A graphic designer and web developer by trade, Drew Terney capitalised on his knowledge of technology in the creative field to launch a freelance journalism career, also specialising in his other passions of movies and book publishing.

As interested in the social impact of technology as he is the circuitry and engineering, Drew's strength is observing and writing from the real-world perspective of everyday technology users and how computing affects the way we work and live.

Comments(1):

1. Premiere Elements

   I downloaded Premiere Elements 9 off the 'net to my Toshiba laptop and it works a treat, it is a simple but handy editing program that can be used on a laptop not designed for video! I use it for creating videos using still images and for mini videos for Youtube. It may not be for the pros and video snobs but for everyone else . . . I recommend it! AJ

   Monday, November 22, 2010 Joan