I don't know about the fz18 but the Canon G9 should come with DPP which will process your RAW files and do a fair amount touch up. Things like white balance, sharpening, cropping. I shoot in RAW pretty much all the time. It will give you everything that the sensor captured so you have more to play with if you want to tweak things in post-processing. That being said the JPegs coming out of most cameras now days are very good but if that's how you have the camera set you have lost a 1/3 or more of the image info right off the bat and you won't get it back. I've used Photoshop Elements which has most of the features you would probably need, it will process RAW files.

I find it better to get some additional documentation because I find the Adobe manuals laking which will run your cost up some. There are other programs around the same or less and you can even get some freeware that does a good job. ArcSoft came with my Pro1 which worked well. You may want to post in the retouching forum and see what they think..

Pauw wrote:.

I'm considering the fz18, or g9 and wanted to know what photo editingsoftware you recommend? Both of these cameras have RAW, but is itworth it? If so, could you recommend a program to also edit raw? I'mnew to all this but your recommendations would be greatly appreciated!.

Doug.

Http://douginoviedo.smugmug.com/..

Try Lightroom's 30-day trial. Of course, it's $299, but using it for 30 days might convince you. It's a great photo management and editing tool. After trying the 1.4 version for 30 days, you may want to consider trying the 2.0 version beta for another 30 days. If you need to work in layers and add text, consider PS Elements..

Http://adobe.com/lightroom.

In any case, I'd pick the G9; larger sensor...

I'm a big fan of LightZone from http://lightcrafts.com/.

If you expect to edit selective regions of images (to correct something less than the entire image), then I think LightZone has the easiest selection masking technology..

Pauw wrote:.

I'm considering the fz18, or g9 and wanted to know what photo editingsoftware you recommend? Both of these cameras have RAW, but is itworth it? If so, could you recommend a program to also edit raw? I'mnew to all this but your recommendations would be greatly appreciated!.

Galleries: http://www.dheller.net.

I am one of the few who decry elitism...

I would certainly recommend the one that I use which is Ulead Photoimpact..

I use a very old version which does not I think handle RAW but the latest probably does and it is a bargain price compared to Adobe products..

You would need to check if it handles raw but if it does as far as I can see it does everything else that photoshop does at a fraction of the price..

Mark_A..

Fz18 should come with silypix but honestly shooting in raw with a pand s will frusrate you to death.shoot jpegs an edit wth photoshop elements..