Watermarks Program or Adobe Elements 8?

Question

Hello. I am looking for a watermark program for my photos. I see that I can get a dedicated watermark program for about 20 dollars but I also noticed Elements 8 is on for about 70. From what I understand, Elements 8 will also do a watermark and I would be tempted to go the extra 50 to get both a watermark AND I assume a very good basic photo program that will run in conjunction with iPhoto.
Can anyone familiar with Elements 8 advise me if it does in fact do watermarks in addition to being a quite good photo program?
Any comments or suggestions would be appreciated.
Thanks.

Answer 1

If you only expect to do watermarking on photos one of the dedicated watermarking applications would probably be the better choice. However if you think you might want to do more advanced editing over and above what iPhoto can do then IMO Photoshop Elements for Mac would be the better choice. Some of the types of editing it's capable of are : Example 1 - Example 2 - Example 3 and Example 4 (although the video if of Photoshop, PSE has the same capability). Also visitAdobe's PSE site for some of the newer features which are really mind blowing. Amazon.com has a special on it for only $39.99 after coupons which are available at the site. Go to this page: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B002ID8R34/macintoucwebsite/ref=nosim.
If you do go the PSE route the following may be of some help to you:
Using Photoshop (or Photoshop Elements) as Your Editor of Choice in iPhoto.
1 - select Photoshop as your editor of choice in iPhoto's General Preference Section's under the "Edit photo:" menu.
2 - double click on the thumbnail in iPhoto to open it in Photoshop. When you're finished editing click on the Save button. If you immediately get the JPEG Options window make your selection (Baseline standard seems to be the most compatible jpeg format) and click on the OK button. Your done.
3 - however, if you get the navigation window that indicates that PS wants to save it as a PS formatted file. You'll need to either select JPEG from the menu and save (top image) or click on the desktop in the Navigation window (bottom image) and save it to the desktop for importing as a new photo.
This method will let iPhoto know that the photo has been editied and will update the thumbnail file to reflect the edit..
NOTE: With Photoshop Elements 6 the Saving File preferences should be configured: "On First Save: Save Over Current File". Also I suggest the Maximize PSD File Compatabilty be set to Always. *I believe the later versions of PSE would require the same preferences stetting but I've not had the opportunity to try them to confirm.*
If you want to use both iPhoto's editing mode and PS without having to go back and forth to the Preference pane, once you've selected PS as your editor of choice, reset the Preferences back to "Open in main window". That will let you either edit in iPhoto (double click on the thumbnail) or in PS (Control-click on the thumbnail and seledt "Edit in external editor" in the Contextual menu). This way you get the best of both worlds
2 - double click on the thumbnail in iPhoto to open it in Photoshop. When you're finished editing click on the Save button. If you immediately get the JPEG Options window make your selection (Baseline standard seems to be the most compatible jpeg format) and click on the OK button. Your done.
3 - however, if you get the navigation window that indicates that PS wants to save it as a PS formatted file. You'll need to either select JPEG from the menu and save (top image) or click on the desktop in the Navigation window (bottom image) and save it to the desktop for importing as a new photo.
This method will let iPhoto know that the photo has been editied and will update the thumbnail file to reflect the edit..