Has anyone tried the GIMP freeware for editing?

[spidermike]

Having played around with Canon DPP I am now thinking of moving into bespoke phot editing software. I have recently come a cross the GIMP freeware - has anyone used this?

I see the comparison being broken down to two parts - functionality and ease of use. At the moment I am not doing vast amounts of editing so I guess I would be happy to compromise a bit of speed/ease of use. But if PSElements v6 (or similar) offers significant advantages I may well go for that.

Cheers

[Brad Proctor]

The GIMP will work if you don't have the money as it has many of the capabilities that Photoshop has.  However, it is lacking in some areas such as it does not have the ability to work on 16-bit images.  Also, maybe it was just me, but even though it has color management capabilities, it doesn't seem to embed icc profiles in the files which can be a real pain.

If these things don't bother you, then the GIMP is a very capable photo editing program.  I used it for a quite a while before I could afford Photoshop.

[kkopchynski]

An inexpensive yet very functional alternative to photoshop is Picture Window Pro.  You may also find that elements suits your needs. They are both about the same price.