I use MaxIM DL 4 for all my data collection and preprocessing.  I find it to be an excellent program for these applications.  Most of my finishing work is done with Photoshop, which is an incredible tool in the hands of an experienced user.  I also use CCD Stack, CCD Sharp, AIP4Win Version2, Registax 3, and K3CCDTools (and probably several other programs that I can't recall right now).

I will be adding some tutorials about image processing when I get time.... so check in later!