Jan
6
Killer Imaging Software
Filed Under Uncategorized
Image manipulation software is a required tool in every web designer and developers tool box. If you are an independent contractor, however, the large price tag on Adobe Photoshop can take quite a bit out of your budget and your paycheck.
Recently, while poking around to find a more affordable alternative to Photoshop for Mac, I happened upon one of my greatest software finds to date: Pixelmator (Mac only). I really cannot say enough nice things about this software. PixelMator is not going to dethrone the king of photo manipulation any time soon, but this is no sophomorish, el-cheapo alternative. PixelMator is serious photo manipulation that has many of the features we all love about Photoshop and has on kick-ass user interface. Pixelmator also costs about one-tenth the price of Photoshop at just $59.00 US.
Pixelmator was founded in 2007 by London, UK brothers Saulius and Aidas Dailide. Judging from the photos on their web site, the brothers are fairly young and so have a long and bright career ahead of them developing software. For more information or to purchase Pixelmator, visit their web site at www.pixelmator.com.
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8 Responses to “Killer Imaging Software”
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Hi! Your Pixelmator link isn’t working. I think you need to take the “e” out at the end.
Thanks for the info tho!
Thanks, Rebecca. I fixed the link. I don’t know why my fingers insist on putting an “e” at the end of that word.
Pixelmator is a very nice product. Too bad it doesn’t do vector graphics though. I’ve been bugging them about that on their feedback forums for some time now.
Until pixelmator has vector graphics, or at least simple “paths” (like in the gimp) i’ll continue using the gimp for my imaging needs.
Hey Pelle,
Yeah, it would be nice if they had vector capabilities. Then I really would not need to give Adobe all my hard-earned money. I like Gimp pretty well but I have 2 issues with it. First, the GUI is just so bad. I know this is me being a bit of a design snob, but it definitely appears to have been designed by an engineer. Second, the tools all work so differently than they do in Photoshop that it’s hard to get my brain to think the way Gimp does. But don’t get me wrong, I have it installed and was using it regularly before discovering Pixelmator. All-in-all I think Pixelmator is an amzing piece of software for under $100. It’s only fair to mention also that Gimp is an amazing piece of software for $0.
BTW, are you aware of any other image software alternatives to the ones we have mentioned? I am working on an idea for a series of articles on how to build a high-quality web site for about $100.
Nah, you’re no design snob. The GIMP in OS X looks like a pile of crap. I don’t like the fake aqua gtk they are using, and personally I think X11 is less than optimal. I’d rather have a “normal” clearlooks gtk, and using native gtk (gtk-quartz) but that version is far from finished ATM.
I love using the gimp in Windows/Linux though.
About alternatives in OS X. Acorn is pretty decent (it can’t rival pixelmator though).
Also, i’ve looked into vector editors to supplement the lack of vector graphics in pixelmator. Unfortunately this is an area that is lacking as well. I love sketch and drawit, but they’re too buggy ATM. Vectordesigner lacks features, but they’re supposedly working on a new version that will be released in the summer months. Inkscape is non-native (and thus quite ugly, in OS X). I always thought inskape was kind of ugly anyway, even in it’s native environment (linux/gtk).
When it comes to code editors in OS X, i personally am using skedit. It’s a real find, for a web developer. Real cheap too. Does pretty much what coda and espresso does. But i guess a pure text editor would do as well, such as textmate/textwrangler.
In linux i use bluefish and geany, although gedit is pretty sweet too. They’re not full featured for web development such as skedit (well, bluefish is, kinda), but i like them nevertheless.
In windows, i would probably opt for phpdesigner. That thing has always did rock. Even when it was a free BETA. A little expensive, perhaps.
Let’s not forget the free komodo edit. It’s cross platform, but that also means it doesn’t lookfully native. Close, but still… It’s a great code editor though.
Feel free to email me if you have any questions
I’ll have to check out all the options you mention in my – (insert laughter) – free time. Just kidding. I think it would be good, though, if there were at least one viable alternative to the Adobe Suite. In all honesty, I think the Adobe Suite is worth the price, but I just can’t bring myself to lay out US $1,400 for it. That’s more than I paid for my laptop and only $100 less than I paid for my car.
Great suggestions, though. I will definitely take a look at those you listed.
Hi,
Has anybody tried CreativeDocs.Net?
http://www.creativedocs.net/
It won’t run on a Mac, but it has vector graphics has a good feature set, is easy to use and it’s free!
Anthony