Photoshop alternative

[warden]

Well, not really in the same league otherwise the whole world would be using it, but certainly a good tool for limited hobby use.

Exactly. My needs are great now but will be comparatively small 10 years from now. So GIMP has that long to improve.

 

[runswithsizzers]

I don't see any reply from @Neil Grant since his opening post last August, so we don't know if he is still interested, but for anyone who wants
"a non-subscription alternative to run on Mac? I dont need all the bells and whistles of PS. Just normal image file editing..."
then the first thing to try is Apple's "Photos" app that came installed free on your Mac. It is very capable for most normal image editing.

 

[glbeas]

There's one more finesse to this - if GIMP knows you have RawTherapee, it will act like Camera Raw does for Photoshop - you open a raw file in RawTherapee and when you are done making edits, it passes the open file over to GIMP where you can keep working on it.

Im having real problems with my raw conversion. My Gimp came with Darktable and its refusing to load nef files from my D750. I downloaded Raw Therapee best I can tell in the right place and Gimp refuses to show it in the plugin list even though it shows it while loading presets when you open the program. What brick do I need to hit the darn thing with to make it work right? This is beyond aggravating.

 

[djdister]

Im having real problems with my raw conversion. My Gimp came with Darktable and its refusing to load nef files from my D750. I downloaded Raw Therapee best I can tell in the right place and Gimp refuses to show it in the plugin list even though it shows it while loading presets when you open the program. What brick do I need to hit the darn thing with to make it work right? This is beyond aggravating.

Raw Therapee doesn't work as a plugin, it is a lead-in app to GIMP.

Do this:
- In RawTherapee's Preferences > External Editor, you can set the path to GIMP to enable seamless workflow integration.
- Open your RAW image in RawTherapee for exposure, color, and lens corrections (alternatively you can make similar adjustments in GIMP).
- Use the "Edit current image in external editor" button in RawTherapee to send the image to GIMP.

 

[EricTheReddish]

Affinity photo is a one time $70 purchase and is also a very good alternative.

The Affinity suite is free now.

 

[koraks]

Im having real problems with my raw conversion. My Gimp came with Darktable and its refusing to load nef files from my D750. I downloaded Raw Therapee best I can tell in the right place and Gimp refuses to show it in the plugin list even though it shows it while loading presets when you open the program. What brick do I need to hit the darn thing with to make it work right? This is beyond aggravating.

When I shoot digital RAW, I edit with RawTherapee and mostly keep it at that. If I want to add something that's quicker to do in GIMP afterwards, I just take the exported JPG or TIFF from RT and open it in GIMP. IMO there's very little benefit in trying to integrate the workflow/tools.

 

[glbeas]

Thank you for your recommendations djdister and koraks! I”ll be digging into this. Been very annoying having to bounce back and forth between apps using way too much time and getting little results.

 

[Romanko]

I used Darktable for all my editing for many years before purchasing Affinity Photo v2 just before the company was acquired by Canva. Affinity Photo is pretty much dead now since it became a "free" subscription product.

 

[koraks]

Affinity Photo is pretty much dead now since it became a "free" subscription product.

In what way is it 'dead'? I use the free version from time to time. Seems to work fine within the limitations I mentioned earlier.

 

[Romanko]

It is dead as a pay-once software that you own. It most likely will not stay free.

 

[koraks]

Ok, so perhaps we should rephrase it as "it may not remain free" instead of "it's dead". Because it really isn't dead. It's very functional and usable as it is.

 

[brotz]

Affinity is free now, but consensus is that it will be made unbearably bad within a couple of years.

 

[koraks]

consensus is

Among whom, based on what data, what does 'unbearably bad' constitute" and what's "a couple"?

Welcome to Photrio btw!

As to Affinity: I know what it is and what it does today. I'm aware of potential strategies for achieving lock-in with users, but there are other possible strategies that do not automatically lead to exploitation of such a lock-in, instead relying on network externalities or similar dynamics to basically make a bigger pie altogether. I have not studied the strategies of Canva, past or present, nor do I know whether these are published, formally or unofficially (a.k.a. 'leaked'). I do enjoy it when people not only make subjective statements, but also show why they feel this way and what factual basis they have for their statements in cases where this isn't automatically obvious.

 

[runswithsizzers]

I am always a little suspicious of free software.

Sometimes software is free because the user is somehow exploited for the benefit of others (advertising, data mining, etc.)

Sometimes software is free because the developer is a hobbiest who may have limited resources to develop the software and manage a business (and who may loose interest at any time).

Sometimes software is free because the developer is beta testing a new product with the intention of charging for the software later when it becomes more mature.

Sometimes software is free because the developer wants to upsell you add-on premium features. This seems to be the case with Canva/Affinity.
--

Personally, I don't mind paying for my photo editing software if it provides the editing tools I need, if the user interface is efficient, and if it is not too annoying to use. Early on, I played around with GIMP and Affinity Photo, but decided I'd rather spend my time using Adobe Lightroom Classic. I don't use Lightroom every day, but I do use it 2 or 3 times a week. After learning how to do what I want to do in Lightroom, I really don't want to have to start over and learn a whole new way of doing everthing with some other software.

When I first started using Lightroom in 2016, it was already a full-featured product. But since then, a number of significantly useful features have been added. In addition to being a very capabale RAW editor, I use Lightroom as a catalog, for managing metadata (captions, keywords, etc.), and to layout photo books for printing. With a plug-in from SmugMug, I also use Lightroom to conveniently manage my photo webpage.

I can't say I love Adobe's subscription business model, but I feel like I am fortunate to be able to afford access to sophisticated software which doesn't suck. I don't have a lot of money to spend on my photography hobby, but I'd rather spend a little more on the software I actually use, and spend a little less on old cameras which I probably wont use nearly as often. ;-)

 

[isaac7]

DaVinci Resolve has now added a photo page that allows you to use their tools on stills. Their color tools are widely considered excellent in the video world. Their nodes based approach requires a different way of thinking than photoshop but it looks quite powerful. They also have some sort of library organizing and tagging system that they developed around video production. Apparently it is much easier for teams to work on projects as well compared to Adobe’s approach. Resolve doesn’t offer the same level of image editing that Photoshop does but you could combine it with another program like Affinity. It’s very common to do this in the video world. Many people do most of the editing in Premiere or Final Cut and then use Resolve for color work.

Most of the tools, both for video and stills, in Resolve are free. The full version isn’t all that expensive IMO and it is a single purchase. Their approach is proof that giving the software away to most people can be sustainable and be developed over the years. The Affinity suite being free is an amazing package. It could change in the future but why dismiss a free tool that we have right now?

Apple now has a really cheap subscription ($13 a month?) that includes Photomator Pro along with a whole suite of other programs like Final Cut and Logic Pro. That subscription also includes iPad versions. For a long time GIMP was the only free program that came close to what photoshop could do. Now we have multiple free and cheap programs that are quite a bit more polished and probably powerful. Adobe has at last got some serious competition for hobbyists and small businesses.

 

[koraks]

Sometimes software is free because the developer wants to upsell you add-on premium features. This seems to be the case with Canva/Affinity.

This is for sure the case, but I think an additional rationale is that they try to grow the userbase and thereby position themselves more firmly in the market. Of course, this goes hand in hand with the argument you mentioned.

Another item not present on your list is that the project is community-based and a collective of developers sees merit in maintaining it without payment, as is common in the open-source domain. This applies to GIMP.

 

[MattKing]

I think the "use it a little and it's free, want to use it a lot, with extra bells and whistles, and it will need to be paid for" can be a really good model, that suits well the interests of the potential user.
It all depends on the quality of implementation, of course.

 

[koraks]

That's the model used for Fusion 360 as well as the classic 'shareware' model that allowed limited use for free, but required payment for intensive or professional use.

 

[isaac7]

This is for sure the case, but I think an additional rationale is that they try to grow the userbase and thereby position themselves more firmly in the market. Of course, this goes hand in hand with the argument you mentioned.

Another item not present on your list is that the project is community-based and a collective of developers sees merit in maintaining it without payment, as is common in the open-source domain. This applies to GIMP.

I can’t help but think that having polished, comprehensive software for cheap or free is a bigger threat to open source programs than it is to Adobe in the short run. I haven’t used GIMP in a very long time but it has always been known to be a bit janky and feature incomplete compared to Photoshop. The cost of photoshop and Adobe’s later move to cloud and AI made using and developing GIMP attractive. Now? I’m not sure how GIMP is going to attract more users when compared to the likes of Affinity and now Resolve.

I think that GIMP’s best long term outlook is that it allows developers to add features or workflows that aren’t available in more mainstream releases. I’m not quite sure what those could be at this point but it is an advantage of open source software.

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

I can’t help but think that having polished, comprehensive software for cheap or free is a bigger threat to open source programs than it is to Adobe in the short run. I haven’t used GIMP in a very long time but it has always been known to be a bit janky and feature incomplete compared to Photoshop. The cost of photoshop and Adobe’s later move to cloud and AI made using and developing GIMP attractive. Now? I’m not sure how GIMP is going to attract more users when compared to the likes of Affinity and now Resolve.

I think that GIMP’s best long term outlook is that it allows developers to add features or workflows that aren’t available in more mainstream releases. I’m not quite sure what those could be at this point but it is an advantage of open source software.

Won't AI allow newcomers to start their own editing sites pretty easily and compete with Adobe and others?

 

[isaac7]

Won't AI allow newcomers to start their own editing sites pretty easily and compete with Adobe and others?

Photoshop is really deep. It’s the kind of thing that you don’t know what you don’t know about it until you get some training. As you learn about it your horizons broaden. All that’s to say I don’t know how you could vibe code anything but the simplest of editors if you are pretty new to it. Even if they did they would be held back by the limits of the program which would echo their lack of knowledge. What is much more likely is that they would simply tell an AI system to do stuff for them instead of figuring out how to manually manipulate the image.

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

Photoshop is really deep. It’s the kind of thing that you don’t know what you don’t know about it until you get some training. As you learn about it your horizons broaden. All that’s to say I don’t know how you could vibe code anything but the simplest of editors if you are pretty new to it. Even if they did they would be held back by the limits of the program which would echo their lack of knowledge. What is much more likely is that they would simply tell an AI system to do stuff for them instead of figuring out how to manually manipulate the image.

Well, that's the point of AI. You could prompt it by saying: "Reduce the brightness of the sky and increase contrast in the foliage on the right side. Eliminate all dust spots. etc. Slightly blur the background behind the person. Add a small black border around the picture."

For many, amateurs especially, prompting the system by typing or by voice into a microphone on a laptop or desktop will be a more approachable and simpler process than messing around with sliders and curves in Photoshop. Of course, Adobe will implement AI in their own products. They may be forced to lower prices if competitors show up, which I suspect will.

 

[_T_]

You could do that but what you would get back would no longer be a photograph. It would be an image generated by the ai as prompted by the original photograph but no part of the original image information would remain

 

[isaac7]

You could do that but what you would get back would no longer be a photograph. It would be an image generated by the ai as prompted by the original photograph but no part of the original image information would remain

Oh don’t get me started lol. I’ve never warmed up to digital cameras let alone getting into the weeds of digital editing. I’ll try not to derail the thread too much… Safe to say that many of the people that like using AI for image manipulation or anything else won’t be too hung up on the philosophy of photography. If they were I’m sure some could argue that the idea of “original information” is just semantics when it comes to digital capture.

Ok, I’m scurrying out of the digital forums before I get carried away lol.

 

[_T_]

If one doesn’t care whether or not an image is an actual capture of information from light which actually interacted with objects in the creation of an image that’s their prerogative.

There’s always been room in the world for images produced outside of photography, and photography has only existed for an instant in the scope of representative art.

But there are realms in which non photographic images of any kind are not very useful. Journalistic photography for one, the justice system for another.

I wouldn’t be very comfortable for example if I were on a jury being asked to convict a defendant on the evidence of an ai enhanced image.

But yeah that’s exactly the way the software works so the line is incredibly clear. The ai takes a guess at what it thinks you want the generated image to look like and no part of the original photograph is included in the result. In fact it’s not possible for it to include the original information in the result as ai unable to do the kind of basic arithmetic involved in basic image transformations. It’s just not designed for those kinds of tasks