With Photoshop’s new pricing model – £17.15 a month for around £205 a year, many amateur and hobbyist photographers are looking at alternatives to this software.
We have covered some of these software’s here and outlined their functionality.
Affinity Photo
This is not a free software however it is fast becoming a real alternative to Photoshop. With it’s great layout and various editing workflow it has taken Photography to another level. It is a software that many professional photographers are starting to adopt and there are many reasons for this. Affinity Photo handles RAW files with its dedicated RAW editing workspace.
Paint.net
This is not really an alternative to Photoshop, but many people will find it great. With its old school layout and the familiar name, it comes off as one of the default windows picture editing software.
This version however is much more, many new features have been added and photographers can get a lot done with this software.
Pixlr
Pixlr is a direct alternative to Photoshop, it’s free and very well adjusted to the modern photographer with iOS and Android versions. The user-interface is incredibly similar to that of Photoshop and the technology really is great – it’s online and available on all your devices.
The software is so much up-to-date that for hobbyist, it’s not simply an alternative to Photoshop but in fact a serious competitor.
GIMP
Gnu Image Manipulation Program (GIMP) is an open source photo editing software that is amazing for many uses. Hobbyist photographers will find it useful for their editing needs but also for many more uses.
Many of us keep an online blog or have web design skills, the software can come in handy in these situations as well. It let’s you re-size, rename and add changes to batches of images – very useful for getting pictures ready to be published online quickly.
The beauty of GIMP is not just that it’s free, it’s also the open source environment – there are plenty of plugins and add-ons that can make this one of the most powerful and free image editing software.
Photoscape
Photoscape might not replace Photoshop completely – it’s a very simple editor but it is free and does all of the basic functions. This program is perfect for when you simply need to edit some pictures or make GIF’s and it once again is free!
It might be time to switch
The truth is that Photoshop is a good software, but is also has an incredibly strong brand name – we don’t say “edit a picture” but rather use the word “Photoshop”. There are many software’s coming up that are to the level of Photoshop, some are free or with a more armature-friendly model.
It is good to know and be aware of the Photoshop alternatives out there, especially the free ones.