Photoshop and Adobe stuff generally is the daddy and industry standard right now and pretty much leads the way in graphic design circles...used it pretty much every day for over 10 years both in work and at home and it rocks...downside is they can be complex to use, so picking it up as a newbie probably is a bit tricky to begin with. It's also very expensive, and a BIG bit of software that needs a reasonably quick machine to run it well.
Years ago I used to use Paint Shop Pro as a lightweight photo editor...I remember that being more simple to use and free...not sure if it's still about?
Or...there's a free open source package...
http://www.gimp.org/
Stands for "GNU Image Manipulation Program" and isn't as dodgy as it sounds, so don't worry about where the link takes you!!!
I've heard good things about it, but since I've always had access to photoshop I've not needed to try it, not sure how easy it is to use, but it is free, and will probably stay that way...so maybe worth a look for anyone wanting a play!
