I know... this has been asked 10,000 times - what's a good scrapbooking software?

[DaveB]

Hello to the forum! Looks like a lot of activity here!

I am just getting into scrapbooking, I was helping my sister originally.

The first job is to put together an electronic in-Memorium scrapbook, that will get printed into hard copy (several copies). Many of the items in this scrapbook will be scans of older photos, diplomas, news clippings and other items. The scanning side is well underway. We also have a very good printer so that is also pretty well handled. I also have Adobe Photoshop ELements to handle image editing - I think that will be OK for what we are doing.

What we don't have is "scrapbook" software. I have started doing some research online but I can't say that I have seen anything that really explained the features of these packages or how they are used. Scrapbook Factory Deluxe 2.0 looks OK but even there the reviews are mixed.

One thing I want to be sure of is that when high quality scanned images are pasted into the electronic scrapbook, that the resolution is not degraded and the printed page looks as good as if I had printed the original scanned image. Is that ever a problem?

I am assuming that there are plenty of tools for adding text in many ways, at least equivalent to Powerpoint. Is that true?

Thanks for any advice you might be able to give!

[Meg]

The program you have (Elements) is an excellant one that several of us use. I used to have the Scrapbook Factory program and it's really not the greatest. Elements is much better and you can do a lot more. The Factory can not edit photos like Adobe programs can and for old photos and memorabilia, you'll need that.

Ask all the questions you want here, there are lots of people to answer them!

[Emma]

LOL, love your title!

I moved this thread into the Choosing Your Software forum, so you can easily find all the previous 10,000 posts. Some good reading there. Just click Software>Choosing Your Software above to go to the thread and start reading.

I love them all for different reasons.

But since you already have PS Elements: USE it. It's one of the Big 4: Photoshop, Photoshop Elements, Paint Shop Pro, and Digital Image Pro. There are others, but these are the main graphics programs, most people use one or more of them, and you'll find the most online support and tutorials and resources for Adobe.

DSU here has 4 PSE classes, with a 5th and 6th on the way. Lots of great tutorials. PSE 3 has an awesome Scan & Divide feature making it easy to get separate images from one group scan.
You don't need Scrapbook software. These are basically super-easy to use programs made for assembling premade graphics. If that's the type of scrapping you're interested in, you can get a scrapbook program. If you'd like more creative freedom, use PSE.

Hope this helps!

[Margie]

click on new to digital in the menu above! it's an article that tells exactly what you're looking for, the difference between "scrapping" software and graphics software.
ps elements is a great program to use for your purposes. check out all the tutorials for it also above by clicking tutorials. you can use it to arrange your pages and text and it would be all you would ever need. if you prefer a simple scrapping program, because it will be easier to use in just compiling pages, then nova's scrapbook factory or hp's creative scrapbook assistant will work. they use a print quality resolution, but just barely. if you are concerned with the quality, i'd stick with ps elements. but read the new to digital article first, it's very helpful! :)

[DaveB]

After reading some of the tutorials, sounds like Adobe Photoshop Elements might be a good place to start. Also read there that some of those "scrapbooking" programs render the images at 200 DPI which is what I feared. Thanks for the advice.

[jtaubman]

You could also look at FotoFusion Pro for putting pages together, it does not create elements etc, but will render to your requirements for external printing, the cheapest edition will print 12x12, I have the middle version which allows larger renders for external printing at 300dpi plus.