I felt that this particular product was not as helpful as I originally thought. The product is useful and does most things successfully, however it sometimes doesn't do what you ask properly or cant seem to correct things properly like the full photoshop can. I feel this product is worth the money seeing as it has all the basic tools; skin airbrushing, layers, you can change eye and hair colour (although not too well on this version), lighting, colour, tones, black and white effects etc. It is very much like an updated version of windows live gallery fix and I would recommend it to others for photo editing and when linked with a graphics tablet you can make nice digital art with it too.

As they say, you can't go wrong by buying the best. Don't plan on understanding all or even most of the features of Photoshop 8.0 CS Win without doing some heavy study. But the few features that you get acquainted with on your own in the short term will do things for your digital photos or pictures that will be worth the price.

The big concept with Photoshop is Layers. I have to admit I don't understand the concept in a working way with the program. Once you get Layers you will be on your way to being a power user.

But I use the program for such things as removing JPEG artifacts from expanses of sky or water. Also for cropping, and for improving photos. You can take a dark photo with hidden detail and bring out the detail--which you couldn't see before!

I figure when I have the time I can explore more complicated/complex features.

You can change photos using tools that take a part of an image and let you place it into another image. This doesn't take classroom study to understand.

It is a pleasure to use a professional level program. It is robust. It challenges you, but it doesn't confuse you.

The depth is tremendous. You know there is so much you don't know, but you are satisfied with the results you are getting at the level you are at.

I would suggest you see if your local college/university book store carries it. There may be a BIG student discount if you qualify.

Also, see if you (or someone you know who is willing to sell or otherwise transfer ownership to you of their copy) has a qualifying upgrade product, so you could then get the "upgrade" price.

I m writing this review of Photoshop 8.0 CS Win based on my 2 years experience with photoshop.
Photo shop 8.0 has some great features which were not present in photoshop 7.0, like its faster in opening, saving files, applying filters etc.

It has some new features like previewing of all filters at same time before applying them and also you can also customise its shortcut keys.

Now I'm writing aboutt basic details to higher details about what photoshop can do.
First of all photoshop is the best image editing software on the market right now.
Photoshop 8.0 gives good support for your scanners and digital cameras. One can directly import photos to photoshop.

1. You can change the background of your photographs by using some cutting tools like (pen, lasso etc.), and then apply new backgrounds.

2. If you have a black & white photo of yours, you can easily colour it by using layers system or by selection system (you can easily find from help menu).
3. you can also use photoshop 8.0 for your web designing purposes (can save image into web types).

4. One other important feature of photoshop is use of filters. There are many filters in photoshop. When you apply different filters on a photo, they give different & amazing result, such as blur filter, noise filter, artistic filter. You can also add filters to photoshop's default filters from the internet or from anywhere else.

5. You can make new backgrounds by using gradient tool, layer blending properties.

6. You can also give hundreds of text styles to your text.

7. One can easily change the contrast, color balance, transparency, replace or change color of clothes, faces etc.

8. You can also change file mode from RGB TO INDEX, CMYK, and greyscale.

9. You can also make actions in photoshop, which will make your work fast. By playing an action, it will do a certain number of commands.

10. You can also make duplicate copies of your cutting photo in a file as many times you want (can make 3 copies in left part of background also in right).

11. there are many useful tools in photoshop like Clone Stamp tool (is used to remove scratches from photo), and Blur tool used to soften the image.

In the end if you want to do interesting, creative and funny things to any photograph, you must try photoshop 8.0 at least once, and then see the amazing result.

Well Photoshop 8.0 C.S for windows is surely an improvement from their last edition photoshop 7.0. I gotta say that it's more user friendly and surely more advance for advance users using it. I hope the photoshop series continue to improve well.

But I don't really think that the current price for it is fair. Why I say so? Because it looks the same as 7.0 so they could have done better.