The whole  digital thing can get pretty up there in price. I personally use Illustrator CS2 and Photoshop CS2. Both have feature that I don't know how I lived without

There used to be a program called Streamline which would turn your line art to a vector drawing.( vecture just means its line art for a computer.) Now Illustrator CS2 has that feature. Its great for basic set up of a drawing to digital.

Photoshop CS2 now has a perspective clone feature and a lens correction feature.

As for the scanner I work in the printing field. NO! not like Kinko's, real printing. Most shops seem to use Agfa scanners they seem to be the best for details and color. Hard to find in stores thou.  Thing is about scanners its hard to find a good large flatbed scanner. You will, find 11"x14" has to be scanned in two passes. And you got to line them up after. If you have a digital camera you can probably  use that depending how good of a place you have to shot it. And the camera.

But here is my suggestion to all who are starting off digital. No one wants to spend the money on something that they might find they don't like in the end. Make some connections with people that use the programs you want to use. Or check something like craigslist.org. for the program. Many people are constantly upgradeing the programs. And the old ones end up in storage not being used. See if you can buy the old programs from them. It might end up being cheaper.

Example. I have Adobe CS2 and I started with illustrator 4 and Photoshop 5. The Basic features of both are still the same. Only thing  the newer ones have are more bells and whistles that you might or might not use. So for  a beginner I Suggest go find an old version of photoshop. Its cheaper and if you like it you can save  for the more expensive version. And its all about trial and error.

Also when you get it Try and books on useing it. Helps to have refrence. The Adobe Classroom in a book are pretty good and easy to learn from. HA! if you take a class thats the book they make you buy.

One last thing. Plug-ins are The best thing since the remote control. You can still change the channel with out them but it makes life so much easier. Plug-ins are the same. They are just short cuts to getting things done. (did I just give away my secret.)