The look of the digital camera has changed. More people snap photos with smartphones than actual cameras. But, that doesn’t mean that you can’t still edit those photos with an excellent editing suite. Some suites provide users with all the expensive bells and whistles. Other suites are better left on the shelf. There is, of course, a happy medium too. Some editing software is not overly expensive, but it still provides you with optimal editing tools.

To Begin: Features Are Important

No photo editing software would be complete without features. If you do come across software that doesn’t have features, skip it. Otherwise, consider the types of features that you will need. The most basic features include cropping, red-eye removal, rotation tools, and resizing options. More advanced features include different filters, adding factors to a photo, and fine detail brushes that can be used to enhance a photo.

As a general rule of thumb, purchase software that you may get a great deal of use out of in the future. For example, you may not need those resizing tools right now, but if you plan on becoming a professional photographer you will need to resize. If you never plan to do more than crop the occasional photo in order to make it Facebook worthy, a basic software setup will do.

Next: Ways to Share

What fun are today’s digital photos if you can’t share them? Gone are the days when the only sharing option was email. Today, you can share through all kinds of different social networks and other venues. In addition to clicking a share button, you may also want to find a product that allows you to burn a copy of your photos onto CD. Sure, optical drives are slowly being phased out, but you may need a CD copy of your photos if you ever plan on saving them or printing them. This brings me to another way to share: print.

Mentioning a printed photo in today’s world seems archaic. But, many people still love to print out photos and place those photos in albums. Surprisingly, not all photo editing software options include the ability to print. If you want to print out your photos, you will have to find software that makes printing an option.

Can You Get It All For Free?

You can’t have all of the best editing and feature options in the world for free. But, if you aren’t serious about photo editing and you just want something you can play with, there are a ton of free editing software options. Windows has Live Photo Gallery, which is a free editing suite. You can also check out Picasa (free), which offers basic editing tools. If you do want to have it all, you can expect to spend anywhere from $60 to more than $100. Professional editing suites can reach into the thousands. More likely than not, though, you won’t need a professional editing suite to accomplish the tasks you want to complete.