Prateek Bhardwaj

You cannot get the latest version for free even if you take an education license. You can try it for 7 days after that you have to pay to use. But the good thing is that Adobe softwares are now subscription based. That means you can pay monthly to use the software and you can pay only for the month you want to use the software for. And if you still want a free version of photoshop you can try for CS2 version. Creative Suite 2 and earlier versions are available on the Adobe website and they are free to use and keep. You can still do a lot of stuff on Photoshop CS2 if you dont want the latest features (some of them are not useful anyways).

Yes. Photoshop CS2 is still relevant for some uses like digital painting. And best of all its free. And you can even do some editing and retouching on it. So if you dont need all the latest bells and whistles of the latest softwares and if you are worried about piracy, you can go ahead and still use CS2. Some local photo studios still use CS/CS2. Hope it helps.

I mistakenly joined an institute thinking I will be a pro but my learnings were done mostly in the long sleepless nights and early mornings. All you need to learn any software is the will to start, a good mentor or a good tutorial (which are plenty nowadays). Mentors are essential if you want to succeed in any field. Later when I started working freelance I learned through trial and error as mentors and tutorials were scarce at that time. Its been 13yrs since then and I have trained employees of multiple companies, freelanced for some top companies and currently Im the no 1 trainer here on Urbanpro. Hope that gives you some motivation to start.

Man, you must be overwhelmed by all the answers. I would recommend you do NOTHING BUT RESEARCH right now. Everyone has their own opinion, but you need to decide what you want to do and why. Now comes the most crucial part. WHY? Why do you want to do Animation or Graphics? Are you into Video games, Animes, Cartoons or VFX movies? Or did you hear from some friend or relative that Animation is good with Loads of money to be made? If it's the latter, forget about the whole thing. Animation takes a lot of time to learn and as much hard work as MCA or MBA or any discipline for that matter. And don't think of going to an institute for counselling as the counsellors some sales girls will show you footage of Bahubali or a Hollywood VFX movie and wash your mind and cost you lakhs. Trust me; I've been there, and so has many of my countless students. Research on your own and then make a decision. I hope it helps.