Elements is a cool program and lots of fun to use, but figuring out how to make it do what you want is another matter. Elements comes only with a quick reference guide, and it doesn’t go into as much depth as you might want. Elements’ Help files are very good, but of course you need to know what you’re looking for to use them to your best advantage. (Elements’ Help files are online now; you can download a PDF of them from Adobe’s Elements support pages at www.adobe.com/support/photoshopelements.)

You’ll find a slew of Elements titles at your local bookstore, but most of them assume that you know quite a bit about the basics of photography and/or digital imaging. It’s much easier to find good intermediate books about Elements than books designed to get you going with the program.