Software for Digital Photography
		As a teen, I had a darkroom in the basement of our Long Island home.  A darkroom session required a run to the store to pick up chemicals and paper; then the chemicals had to be mixed and placed into trays.  The cardboard on the basement windows had to be reattached, and I had to warn my family not to enter.  Finally, I was ready to go. Digital darkroom sessions are a bit easier.  All I need to do is power up my computer, and in a few minutes, I'm ready to go.  I don't need chemicals and I don't need a darkroom (although I do need ink and paper for those pictures that are not destined for on-line viewing).  I can do short sessions, for just five or ten minutes, without the need for a lengthy setup and cleanup. Here is my current setup (as of August 2002) Computers Due to limited desk space, I have been using laptop computers for a number of years.  After two Gateway laptops (the first was a 100Mhz machine, the second was a 300MHz machine, both of which were fine machines), I am now using a Compaq Presario 1710, with a 1GHz processor, 30MB hard drive, and 256MB of memory.  Performance is quite acceptable, certainly an improvement over my previous 300Mhz laptop. If desktop space were not an issue, I would have preferred a CRT monitor for my digital darkroom.  The brightness of the laptop's LCD screen varies greatly, depending upon the viewing angle.  The kids' computer (a Dell 4100 with an 800MHz Celeron) does have a nice Viewsonic monitor, so if I get desperate, I can view images on that machine. A regular desktop computer is also tempting (despite the additional noise) since for the same price as a laptop, I could have gotten a faster machine with greater capacity and a better video card.  However, the Compaq laptop has performed quite well, and I still have plenty of extra disk space left. Unfortunately, with HP in the process of swallowing Compaq, I would be hesitant about purchasing  computers from either of these companies until the direction and support of the new company is clear. Scanners After patiently waiting months for the price of the Nikon Coolscan IV to drop, I finally purchased the Minolta DIMAGE Scan Elite II in an unexplained fit of impulse buying at Keeble and Shuchat's annual sale.  I hadn't even done any research on the scanner, relying instead of the word of a salesperson who claimed that the two scanners were very similar in quality and features. My first "road test" left me wondering if I made a mistake, but after several more scanning sessions, I've figured out the ropes and I am happy with the quality and performance of the scanner.  Minolta's Twain driver is somewhat quirky, and I often find myself doing the wrong thing, but it does have a few nice features.  I also use VueScan (see below) as an alternative, but it has its own quirks. My Compaq laptop has a firewire connection, so I have been using the scanner's faster firewire connection rather than the USB connection (but it's not just the speed: I have a handful of USB devices, and I've found in the past that sharing a hub with a data-intensive USB device can cause all sorts of problems). We also have an HP OfficeJet G55 all-in-one (scanner/printer), hooked up to our local network with an HP JetDirect 175X.  It can scan and print photos, but that's not really it's strong suit, and we use it primarily for non-photographic tasks. Printer The Canon CP-100 (which I also purchased at the aforementioned Keeble and Shuchat sale) is a small dye sublimation printer that can produce 4x6 prints directly from many Canon digital cameras (rumor has it that Canon will sell a computer hookup, but for now, you can only print from the camera).  To print pictures from the computer, you need to download them into the camera (or copy them to a compact flash card and then put that into the camera).  This works but it's a pain. I have been underimpressed with the quality of the prints.  At our summer family reunion on the northern California coast, people oohed and aahed about the "instant" prints but there were several comments about the sharpness (or lack thereof). The paper and ribbon come packaged together.  There are several different types of paper; I have been using the 4x6 paper, which has postcard markings on the back (and why would I go through the effort of printing out a nice picture and then sending it through the US Postal Service without an envelope?).  The paper is no bargain; I can't recall what I paid, but I think it comes out to more than 50 cents per picture. Overall, I'd say that the CP-100 is an overpriced toy. Software VueScan ACDSee v4 IrfanView Paint Shop Pro v7 HyperSnap