coverstory 9 Free Photoshop Alternatives For Powerful Editing is a dominant player among industry professionals but there are some alternatives available which can be useful when you need an intermediate level of editing and photo touch ups only – Raj Kumar Maurya

he most important thing is that these functionality of this tool can be extended by installing the photoshop alternative software are free where plugins. as Photoshop comes for a hefty fee, something • Supported Platforms: Windows 7 or Later Tthat individuals and small businesses may not • Key Features: Selection editing, Layers, Histogram, be able to afford. With these free Photoshop alternatives Retouching, Resizing, Noise removal, Sharpening, you will get simpler interface and variety. Colour correction, Plugin support. • Supported File Formats: RAW files, BMP, JPEG, GIF, GIMP TIFF, PNG. GIMP stands for ‘GNU Image Seashore Manipulation Seashore is an Program’. It open-source is an old and image editing well-known tool for Mac tool for photo users. This editing. With a tool is based widely supported community and compatibility across on GIMP various operating systems, GIMP is one of the best free technology and alternatives to Photoshop. Although it doesn’t offer quite offers major a features like Photoshop but it possesses all basic and editing features some advanced features. like gradients, textures, and anti-aliasing for both text and • Supported Platforms: Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, brush strokes. BSD, Unix, SkyOS • Supported Platforms: Mac OS X • Key Features: Layers, Selection editing, HDR, • Key Features: Layers, Alpha channel support, Re-touching, Noise removal, Lens and Colour gradients, transparency, Anti-aliased brushes and correction, Sharpening, Plugin support, etc. Plugin support. • Supported File Formats: RAW formats, BMP, GIF, • Supported File Formats: JPEG, PNG, TIFF, XCF. JPEG, PNG, TIFF, PSD, etc. Pixlr Paint.NET This is an This tool on the go is very Photoshop similar to alternative default Paint that means software of you can use Windows but it anywhere with some anytime advance without capabilities. installing It’s not as powerful as GIMP, , but it takes care of all the anything on your computer system. All you need is a basic editing features that require editing an image. The browser and an internet connection. Pixlr is the simple

36 PCQuest APRIL 2016 pcquest.com twitter.com/pcquest facebook.com/pcquest linkd.in/pcquest [email protected] web-based image editor with Photoshop-like features, layouts and keyboard shortcuts. • Supported Platforms: Web-Based, Android, iOS • Key Features: Selection tools, Text overlays, Layers, Re-sizing, Red-eye removal, teeth whitener, Filters, and Effects, etc. • Supported File Formats: BMP, JPEG, GIF, TIFF, PNG.

PicMonkey Like Pixlr, PicMonkey is • Supported Platforms: Linux and Windows another online • Key Features: Adobe Illustrator import, Shapes, image editing textures, text, effects, filters etc. tool which • Supported File Formats: Supports JPG, GIF, PNG, lets you edit TIFF, BMP, PICT, XPM, and others. your images right from your browser. Krita is a FREE It offers tools sketching like blemish and painting removal, wrinkle removers and such more. You can program. It is upload an image from your computer, or point it directly one of the best to a URL elsewhere on the Web. image editing • Supported Platforms: Web-Based tools, based • Key Features: Shapes, textures, text, effects, filters, on the open- and overlays, etc. source. It comes • Supported File Formats: BMP, JPEG, GIF, TIFF, PNG. as a bundle with the KOffice suite and a great powerful image editing tool for Linux or Unix users. Inkscape • Supported Platforms: Windows, Linux, BSD, Unix. Inkscape is • Key Features: Brush Stabilizers, Pop-up Palette, an open- intuitive user interface, Wrap-around mode, source vector Mirroring Tools, layers etc. graphics • Supported File Formats: Any Windows-compatible editor used media format. for creating a wide variety CinePaint of graphics If you are a such as Linux or Unix illustrations, user and want icons, logos, diagrams, maps and web graphics. some powerful • Supported Platforms: Linux, MacOx, Windows image • Key Features: Shapes, textures, text, effects, filters, retouching and overlays, etc. tool with • Supported File Formats: It can import and export support for various file formats, including SVG, AI, EPS, PDF, PS even high 32-bit color images then CinePaint is for you. and PNG. The tool is not used to edit or retouch images only but also support videos. Xara Xtreme • Supported Platforms: Linux, BSD, Unix, Mac OS X Xara Xtreme is a general purpose graphics program • Key Features: 32-bit image editing, Retouching, for Unix platforms including Linux, FreeBSD and (in Frame manager, etc. development) OS-X. Formerly known as Xara LX, it is • Supported File Formats: BMP, CIN, DPX, EXR, GIF, based on Xara Xtreme for Windows. JPEG, OpenEXR, PNG, TIFF, and XCF. pcquest.com twitter.com/pcquest facebook.com/pcquest linkd.in/pcquest [email protected] APRIL 2016 PCQuest 37