Morning All,

As above.

Would like something to play about on – novice level stuff e.g. B&W pics but with splashes of colour etc.

Any suggestions?

Apple Apeture. If I could afford a Mac, that's what I'd get. 🙂

iphoto

Are you looking to make adjustments to images, like exposure, colour balance and so on? If so, Aperture and iPhoto are both very good.

If you want to actually make changes to the photos, then Pixelmator is amazing, truly amazing…

iPhoto is simple image management software, has very limited manipulation features.

Aperture is a more advanced version of that. More to do with organisation and presentation of images, rather than manipulation. Reasonably expensive. Adobe Lightroom is similar.

Adobe Photoshop Elements is a fairly powerful image manipulation application. Allows layers to be used, text overlays, special effects, more complex adjustment than in the ones above. Relatively cheap.

Adobe Photoshop is the daddy of image manipulation, very powerful, very complex, lots of features. Professional level stuff. Loads of features most people will never ever need. Overkill for all but professionals. Very expensive.

GIMP is a free download software package that is very similar to the Photoshop family. Lost of fairly complex features. How it can be free is amazing really. Possibly not as 'compatible' with other software as Adobe's stuff, and I don't know how it compares when it comes to dealing with digital cameras/scanners/printers etc. Starting with PS Elements may be better if you were to progress to full-fat Photoshop.

Give GIMP a try. Can't hurt!

Lightroom & aperture are good but ££ relatively.

I like Pixelmator which for $60 is more affordable and well designed…

Oh yes, Photoshop Elements is pretty darn good as well, for novice stuff there's not a lot it can't do.

Can you get Picasa for mac?

Yes, but Picasa requires an intel processor.

All modern Macs have that now I think?

If you're after freebies;

Picasa for basic touching up.
Seahorse (based on The Gimp) for more advanced.

Beware freebies, as that can be buggy and also sometimes hacked to distribute Malware. Not so much a problem on a Mac, but be careful to only download from the software developers own site if possible.

Personally I'd not bother with Picassa etc, as they're merely add-ons to those web photo services used to promote their commercial printing services etc. iPhoto is perfect for uploading images from your camera, then AdobePS Elements or GIMP for complex manipulation. I'd spend the money on Elements tbh, because Adobe have 20 years experience in this field, more than anyone else, and their products are just better really. Elements takes some of the features from Photoshop, which are superior to those found in GIMP. And if you do progress with image manipulation in the future, then Elements will give you the perfect stepping stone to Photoshop, Illustrator etc.

If you want to spend money, then I can recommend something like a small graphics tablet, which comes with a copy of PS Elements.

http://store.apple.com/uk/product/TX289ZM/A?fnode=MTY1NDA1Mg&mco=MTI5Mjc2MTI&s=topSellers

This is quite a bargain as the tablet is £75 on it's own, and the software about the same, so for £90 you get a bargain. Using a pen and tablet gives you a lot more control with manipulation. Alternatively, Elements often comes bundled with picture scanners too.