Photoshop is still the best. But if your budget is limited, you can use Gimp. It's similar to Photoshop in many ways. And the best part is it's FREE!
Gimp - it fully free of charge and very popular among the users of UNIX graphics editor, carried on a Windows-platform, which due to the wide set of tools will allow you to create, edit and retouch your images and photo. you can draw through such instruments, as aerograf or pencil, to use powerful gradients and blendy. you can create own brushes and patterny for their use in the future. The program will allow you to manipulate pictures, to add layers, make poligonal'nye and Bez'e of selection, to use the objects of texts, load and save animirovannye images, use possibilities of the batch processing for the rapid editing of your pictures Often use them, very like it!!!
i software of choice is photoshop - if you're looking for a free version you could always google photoshop portable or try out photoshop for 30 days, which could be downloaded from the adobe website. few years back i had paint shop pro, its equally great :3
For a limited budget, I recommend GIMP, even thought I personally wouldn't use it. I'm a photoshop kinda guy. I have started to really like Adobe Illustrator though. Macromedia Fireworks is a close third IMHO.
I've been involved in graphic design for many years and, as much as I really hate to admit it, nothing quite comes close to the power of Photoshop. It is designed for just about any graphical occasion (web, print, local, etc.). However, I had written in a previous post as a response to a person contrasting Gimp vs. Photoshop - I explained about how although very similar on the surface, from my experience, Gimp and Photoshop form two completely different purposes. As open-source software, I find Gimp to be quite useful for many things (especially when you're on a tight budget). In your post you mention that you want to create graphics for your website. I think, at least temporarily, Gimp would work just fine for you and it is free over at the Gimp website (As a new user it is against the rules for me to post a link - Sorry!) under the downloads section. There are, in fact, limitations but I don't think they'll conflict too much with what you're trying to accomplish - Gimp has always seemed to be geared more toward local/web-based work than anything else. You can even save your files as .PSD just in case you get your hands on Photoshop at a later time. Hope all goes well with your graphics!
of course phothosop. you could try illustrator too but thats a bit more complicated and you must understand the difference between those two (raster vs vector)
I recommend you that photoshop and fireworks is the best graphic software.. I'm also use this software for making website design...
I've got Macromedia Fireworks 8 Professional and Photoshop CS3. I must say that Photoshop CS3 does hold up to my preferences, but Fireworks ain't that bad either. Not to mention both of them are very user-friendly. But, if your budget is limited, I'd recommend going for GIMP, as suggested above.
download a torrent of the latest photoshop n ur good to go! you gotta learn photoshop to use it to its potential tho