There is no denying the fact that Adobe Photoshop rules the roost in graphics and web design, a plethora of competitors notwithstanding. The steep pricing of the Creative Suite also does not deter the design houses from purchasing the application. However, not every design professional requires the multitude of features as functionalities offered by the versatile software. The graphic designers who are not into print industry and whose work revolves mainly around web graphics design can do with less expensive applications. Adobe has taken note of this fact and that is why it has made a trimmed down version of its behemoth image editing tool and released the Adobe Photoshop Elements.  Available at a fraction of the cost of its big brother, Photoshop CS 5.5, this handy tool fits the bill for the beginners and moderate level graphic designers.

The three tools that the graphic designers will benefit in Photoshop Elements 9 are improve, smudge and cloud. The smudge application helps the designers in dealing with image background objects. With this tool making the background blurred for focussing on the people in the forefront becomes easy. The blur and sharpen tools are self explanatory and come in handy for editing portraits and landscape images. The sharpen tool can be used with images with blur.

In case a designer needs to deal with images shot with a basic digital camera the burn tool comes in handy. This can easily fix the problem of image overexposure, a common issue with images shot with entry level digital cameras. For desaturating colour in a photo the sponge tool is useful for the users of this software. Photoshop elements 9 is also suited for rectifying the problem of red eye that happens with some shots.

The software also comes with a useful feature called clutter eliminator which can be used for making elements like wires, cables in an image vanish from the images. This would take several minutes to achieve with manual method of cloning background in other image editing tools. The Photomerge Style Match also lets the designers to match a photo with specific styles.

The question that remains at the end is whether a Graphic design professional should pick Photoshop Elements 9 for his work or not. This depends on his nature of work and priority. There is no denying the fact that this nifty tool cannot replace dedicated image editing tool. It is not very good for hardcore image editing.  However, the designers mostly involved with web design and photo retouching will benefit from this application. Its lower cost and compatibility with both Mac and Windows gives it a competitive edge.