Best Graphics Editor?

"Jasc PSP, Adobe Photoshop and Corel Photopaint are all good programs. I personally believe that a talented user could use any of them to produced the required results. I would look at PSP first simply for value for money. If wanted skills that looked good on a resume go with Corel or Adobe. Adobe seems to be the preffered option there though there is not much between them."

Photoshop is the industry standard. I personally believe one of the reasons why it's so much more expensive than PSP is that a ton of things are geared towards it. Although both of the programs are highly compitable with each other, you will likely be required to know PS in some studios if you want a design job. The knowledge about both programs translate over to the other, however. If you know PSP really well, then going to Photoshop shouldn't be too much of a mess, and vice versa.

I personally use Photoshop 7 because I just prefer it more, but Animation Shop (which comes with PSP) is another great tool I use at times. If you have the money, get PS, although PSP can do pretty much the exact same things (in fact, it even has a lot better gif/jpeg compression tools, while PS has a lot more plugin filters).