Short and sweet, I currently have Adobe Photoshop Elements 8.0 (paid @$100). I am looking to upgrade (do I need to?) but can't afford a $400-$600 (or more) professional program. $200 is about my limit. Is there something out there that would be more user friendly than Elements 8.0. Or is Elements good for a hobbyist and I just need to learn to use it better? Okay, forget the "short" part of this post (LOL!)....I must add that I stopped shooting in Raw because I found I could get the same results shooting JPEG and Raw was adding so much time to my post processing that I wasn't getting my photos processed in a decent amount of time. I take a LOT of pics every weekend and it was overwhelming to sit down with hundreds of pictures and starting in RAW! I saw Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 4 on Amazon for $149.00. Any opinions on this? Is this any better than Elements 8? As for my interests, I take a lot of landscape stuff, like to photograph pets, people (posed and candid), so pretty general. Thanks for all your opinions and info!
You have a lot of questions in that small paragraph so let me see if I can add to what others have already replied. First off, the questions you're asking are totally appropriate for someone wanting to improve their photography! All of us, amateur and professional, have had to face them and then revisit them as technology and our needs change. Bottom line, find what works for
you.
Your next question seems to be whether you get enough value out of shooting RAW versus JPEG. I'm a consultant by trade, so of course my response is, "it depends." What do you do with your images? Do you post them on a social media site, email them to others, print them or something else? If you are using them for social media or to share with friends, then JPEG is probably okay. If you're printing them or are trying to maximize the potential in each image, then you should consider using RAW.
The next item I noticed is that you take "a LOT of pics every weekend". Is that because you are capturing a lot of different subjects or topics? Or is it because you are taking a lot hoping that some will turn out? It is a hard question to answer because it means looking at how you capture images. If you fall into the latter category, you may need to focus (unintentional pun) more on the technical aspects of photography. I'm speaking from personal experience because when I slowed down a bit my results improved.
So now we get down to software. Your comment of "it was overwhelming to sit down with hundreds of pictures" seems to be the heart of the matter. The hardest thing to learn is what is a "keeper" and to be critical of yourself. Certain tools are designed to help you quickly sort through a lot of images and decide which are keepers. The two most popular are Lightroom and Aperture. Both are excellent cataloging, sorting and selection tools. Once you've selected the best images, then you only need to process a smaller amount of images. Best of all, both of the tools I mentioned allow you to copy how you processed one image to multiple others further speeding up the effort. ANY software requires an investment of time and effort to learn how to use them effectively, but I venture to say that you won't be happy with your photographic results until you do.
Finally, regarding Photoshop Elements - it is a great tool. My brother uses it and has great results. The key is to learn whichever product you choose well.