What is Reddit's opinion of
Affinity Photo?
From 3.5 billion Reddit comments
➔ Affinity Photo website
By popularity on Reddit, this Service is:
100 reviews of this app found across Reddit:
Options are good. Thank you Affinity for leading the charge on iPad.
I still don't know if I can bring myself to drop the cash on a nice iPad. That's lens money.
If it's going to need a CC sub (like I gather it will), I'm sure Affinity Photo and Affinity Designer are better deals.
I've been using Affinity for a few years and really love it. It does everything I need and more. I'm not a professional but I've found it to be intuitive and extremely affordable.
SOME Universities give free access to Adobe CC.
However, if you are on a super tight budget and want a Photoshop clone for cheap, then you might consider Affinity Photo which does 90% of what photoshop can do. It's buy once, you own it. IF you go this route, I suggest waiting for sales as I think it retails for $50 but like at Thanksgiving I bought it straight up for $25. They also have their own sub. /r/AffinityPhoto/ and users sometimes inform you when it goes on sale.
I made these wallpapers using the high-resolution artwork posted by Nintendo of America on Twitter. Enjoy.
Source(s): * Made with Affinity Photo.
Metroid ® is property of Nintendo® (All rights reserved).
©1986-2021 Nintendo®
This image was made for private use, and I have no affiliation with Nintendo® or any of it's subsidiaries.
Nice edit!
For those wondering which software to use, Lightroom and Photoshop are obviously the best photo editors, and Lightroom has the bonus of also being an excellent photo and video library manager. You can subscribe to the Photographer's bundle version of Creative Cloud for $9.99USD/month. It includes Lightroom, Photoshop, Lightroom Mobile and more.
There is also a great, new editor called Affinity Photo and it's quite affordable ($50USD). It has some awesome features and can do a lot of what Photoshop can do. It's now available for Windows as well as Mac.
However, most photo apps can do a decent job of this. GIMP, Apple Photos, etc. can all pull some detail out of shadows and adjust white balance, etc.
Not only that, but they added an absolute ton of features to the platform for both Mac and PC. I haven't tested any of them yet myself, but an overhauled RAW engine, Touch Bar support, 32-bit editing and a ton of other things looks pretty impressive: https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/new-features/
Affinity Photo is an excellent alternative. It's a one-time purchase of $50*USD* and can edit photoshop documents among other great features. It was updated recently and it has only been improved, I am slowly transitioning to it since I have such a large plugin and script library, some of which are not supported by Affinity Photo.
For vector graphics I have switched from Adobe Illustrator to Affinity Designer. Though I missed a couple of features initially, I have no regrets. It's a great tool. $50 one time payment instead of a subscription.
Affinity Photo is currently in (free) Beta, so you might want to check that out too.
Lightroom / Photoshop is the professional standard, and well worth it if you're a serious hobbyist or pro or semi-pro. It's the kind of thing you can put on your resume. However, there is a subscription payment system and it's a big suite to learn. On the plus side, there are a ton of free tutorials online. If you're serious about photography and can afford them, it's worthwhile. (I recommend Lightroom Classic, not Cloud version)
But if you're just starting out, I think a great entry point is Affinity Photo. Normal price US$55, no subscription, full-featured for one by one photo editing. Last year it was half price between November and February, and I wouldn't be surprised to see discounts again in about a month or so.
Affinity Photo is a faster, lighter weight, and better designed in my opinion. And much more reasonably priced ($50).
GIMP is a free and open source, and is arguably more powerful than Photoshop.
Hey OP something else to look into other than Photoshop is Affinity Photo: https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
I personally hate subscription based services so I wasn't too keen on getting Photoshop but Affinity is a one time purchase of about $50 and does basically everything Photoshop does. I've never gone super deep into Photoshop so maybe there's a feature or two Photoshop has this doesn't but I've been using it for months now and haven't found anything that I could do in Photoshop I can't do in Affinity. Just wanted to suggest it!
I don't really see how it has a cult following, but you could also take a look at RawTherapee.
I've heard good things about Affinity Photo, but I've never used it.
Honestly for 95% of the users it has everything you'll really need. For general retouching or art creating and editing it pretty much has it all. It's lacking when it comes to some final print production features as well as some less used things. I just love that it's a reasonable cost and there is no monthly subscription. Definitely check out the demo if you're thinking of buying it: https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
Let me know if you have any specific questions!
First thing I want to say is that your tools i.e. software shouldn't dictate what type of content you are making. That is contingent on your client base and/or the type of work you want to specialize in. Whether you use Avid, FCPX, Premiere, Resolve or what have you, software is nothing more than a tool for storytelling. It seems like a lot of jobs for upcoming editors tends to fuse what corporate video producers do with what ppl in LA & NY do in higher end jobs which is a jack of all trades and master of none which is not helpful.
Also, can't the Affinity product line or Pixelmator fill the lack of photo editing apps? I've literally heard from diehard FCPX users who tend to be very anti-Adobe that they will recommend Affinity image editing products if it means they don't have to have a CC subscription.
On my end, I have both Adobe CC and the whole FCPX suite. My main reason for using AE over Motion is that Motion doesn't have the community engagement that AE has. It was an incredibly smart move on Apple's part to make all FCP effects Motion templates. But the closest thing Motion has to the likes of VideoCopilot or other high profile tutorial authors is Ripple Training. It also hurts Motion a bit that it is Mac only where AE, Fusion, Nuke, Cavalry and others tend to be cross platform. On top of that, famous Youtube filmmakers and social media influencers breaking down how they make their edits basically become unintended promotion for Adobe in some regards.
Given your use case, I suggest you look at Affinity Photo:
https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
They also have an Illustrator alternative, Affinity Designer:
https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/designer/
I have not used Photo, but I use Designer. It's a very robust, full-featured application.
Personally, I think the Lightroom/Photoshop bundle might be a bit more of a commitment than a beginner might wish to make. After all, you are locked into the subscription for $120/year going forward. That said, it's the industry standard, extremely versatile and powerful, and a very useful set of applications to learn. If you're serious about your new hobby, it's worth getting into those.
However, if you're more tentative, I'd recommend Affinity Photo to start with; it's US$50 for Mac or Windows, no subscription commitment. (there was a half price offer between November and April or so ... it might come back if you wait).
https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
Disclosure: I don't use Affinity Photo, but I use Affinity Designer. And if Photo is as good as Designer, it's very good indeed. The Affinity Suite has been getting a lot of attention, and for good reason. The Adobe suite needs robust competition, and I think Affinity is the best I've seen.
Also, I have been told that Adobe Bridge is free (but I can't confirm that). It's a great image browser. I believe you need to download Adobe Cloud to install Bridge. If I'm mistaken, someone please let me know.
There are other options out there, of course; just search "photoshop alternatives".
I think Affinity Photo is rapidly becoming the editing software of choice for those who don't need or want the bloat, or the subscription commitment, of Photoshop/Lightroom:
Adobe has been making photoshop increasingly more difficult to pirate over the past couple of years. This reason, and the fact that I dont want to open my computer up to viruses, are the reasons I ultimately decided to pay for it. Honestly, $10 a month is a fine price for photoshop and I'm glad I'm paying for it. I dont have to spend hours troubleshooting a pirated version of photoshop with little or no documentation. Instead if I have any problems with photoshop, I'm able to call Adobe's support phone number to get my issue quickly resolved. It's also nice getting updates every so often too.
I realize you're in 10th grade and you may not have a lot of money and this is definitely not the answer you were looking for, but if you get a part time job, you can easily cover the $10 monthly fee. I encourage you to pay for it, but if you are strapped for money, try this online free alternative in the meantime: https://www.photopea.com/. Or you could try the free trial of Affinity Photo: https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/. Or you can try GIMP for basic editing.
>Affinity Designer
This is incorrect. Affinity Designer is a vector drawing program replacement for Illustrator.
To replace Photoshop you must use Affinity Photo instead.
I recently purchased and use - at work, no less - Affinity Photo.
It handles psd and psb files directly to and from photoshop. You can save into psd format and it will be completely compatible.
It's a ground-up rewrite of PS, essentially, by a 3rd party Co. Pretty much anything you bring in is treated as their equivalent of a smart object, without having to first specify it as such.
It's also very cheap. And you buy it, not rent it by the month.
https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
While I was looking for the correct URL to paste here I also spotted it's currently on sale at 30% off. So U.S. $35.99. You can find tons of stuff on youtube if you doubt it can be any good for such a low price, but I've been more than happy with it and I would call myself a pro-level user (masks, overlays, replacements, etc.)
For those wondering about my fanboi suggestion to use their product. No, I don't work for them. Just a happy customer.
Pro is you own the software and get free updates until it get's a major number change, you know like Windows.
Cons, it's not widely used, so affinity files will not open in PS.
But I never had problems sending my files to a print shop to get what I needed. There is an sub that can tell you more.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Affinity/
And I just checked it, it's just 50 bucks. And I would buy it at the Affinity store and not the Windows store.
https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
I just went over it again and saw that there are plenty of things I haven't tried like the 360 degree photo editing, I have to try that soon.
Affinity Photo is an alternative to Photoshop. And you pay for it just once, instead of Photoshop's subscription. There's a trial, too.. I don't remember but I think it's 10 days.
> I want something for quick edits, I mean resizing, hue/saturation/brightness adjustment, cropping, and selecting parts/cutting.
This can be done with the Preview.app.
For more, I support /u/Apodacaac's suggestion to look into Affinity Photo/Designer. Great interface, good features, fast, and reasonable price.
Affinity photo... $49. It's not Photoshop, but it can do much of the same processes, and it's designed to take advantage of modern CPUs and gpus, which is more than I can say for Photoshop. Definitely worth trying out.
Olympus Viewer is free and can edit RAW files. If you're not shooting in RAW already, you should be.
For anyone with a Panasonic camera, they have their own free solution in the form of an older version of SilkyPix.
I like Affinity. For $50 you get a decent RAW editor and a decent photo editor in one. I think the photo editing part blows GIMP out of the water. GIMP also does not handle RAW files, so you need a RAW editor, anyway.
I am excited to see at least one company attempt to compete with Adobe, and several more making software that will do what most people need for not a lot of money. Insane that someone has not written a capable competitor by now.
- Affinity Photo $50 at least claims they are going to take on Adobe
- Acorn $30 Does enough for most.
- Pixelmator $30 Also does enough for most.
All of these are currently Mac only, but Affinity has Windows on their radar.
A little advice: you no longer buy Photoshop, but license it for $10 a month. If you're working on a Mac you might want to try Affinity Photo as it's a one time purchase. It's been winning a lot of awards and stuff. Not saying it's the best option, but is a viable option that will be a lot cheaper. I've only really assessed it from a retouching point of view, so I can't speak for it's design elements.
Affinity Photo is quite powerful and $50: https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
Check out the tutorials: https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/tutorials/photo/
Currently it's only for Mac but coming to Windows soon.
Shout out to Affinity Photo (https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/) does a huge amount of what PS does with no subscriptions and much reduced price.
I know you can't force designers to use it, but the more people who do use it the wider spread it'll be. Please get people to use this where possible!
Note: I'm not affiliated with Affinity in any way - I just REALLY hate Adobe.
Photoshop is the industry-standard professional tool. Its the kind of thing you can use in a job and put on your resume, if you wish.
However, if you're just getting started with light editing, Photoshop might be overkill. It has a lot of features you won't need, and the subscription model might be more of a commitment than you want to make to start with.
Look at Affinity Photo. It's a robust, lower-priced alternative.
Yes. It is a digital painting. I use a drawing tablet with a pen and screen called a Huion Kamvas Pro 12 (2018 version). The programs I use are Clip Studio Paint https://www.clipstudio.net/en/ (drawing, painting) and Affinity Photo (For image editing. It's like Photoshop) https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
Affinity Photo is also great if you're looking for something more powerful, but don't want to pay out the ass for Adobe software. I use it all the time to remove backgrounds from images for my VTT games!
Two things to look into:
Krita: a free open source painting program, simulates actual paint and brushes and such, rather than just pixels. I.e., paint smears and mixes colors when you go back over it. Check out "Age of Asparagus" on youtube for some tutorials.
Affinity Photo https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/ which is much closer to photoshop, with distortions and color correction and all that sort of stuff, but way way cheaper than photoshop.
If you were doing this in Blender, you'd probably use "grease pencil", but that's not really optimized for this sort of art, I think.
Adobe Illustrator is probably best but Adobe Photoshop works too. Those are subscription-based.
You could try Affinity Designer (https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/designer/) and/or Affinity Photo (https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/ ) though.
> https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
I was not aware of this one - amazing for $25 - and ahead of the technical curve! I was laughing pretty hard at this:
>+ Open and edit PSD and PSB files
>
>+ PSD smart object import
Niiiice - thanks for the tip ;)
Affinity photo is fully available for ipad
it's $20, but it's basically a full photoshop alternative for ipad. I have it for PC and it's fantastic.
I tried for years to find the best mapmaking tool - Cartographer's Guild, Dudjinni, Inkarnate, etc. etc. Basically everything except photoshop because I wanted mapmaking to be quick and not have to learn a gigantic bloated program just to do it.
Eventually I stumbled onto r/battlemaps, and specifically found this post. It's assuming the use of photoshop/gimp/something like it (I went with Affinity Photo - it's a one time $50 purchase and it's every bit as powerful as photoshop it seems), but it's pretty agnostic as far as which one you're using.
The learning curve is a little steep at the beginning, I will give you that, but after you make a few maps, you start to get faster and faster as far as knowing what works/what doesn't.
In the end, it's really graphic design, and so your best tool is a graphic design tool in my opinion.
Hope that all helps!
I highly recommend Affinity Photo - It's $50 and has almost all the functionality of Adobe's Photoshop - It also has a very similar interface - so if you ever do get into the professional world you'll be ready
Have you thought about Affinity Photo? https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/desktop/.
It's a little pricey but it's a one time thing. They're pretty comparable to Adobe Ps.
Uh yeah it does run Affinity...
https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/designer/ipad/
https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/ipad/
I bought designer and have screwed around in it a little bit on my iPad and it is a legit full featured version of the app. The sample files I've checked out in it were highly impressive and its brush engine may be better than Illustrator's based on my testing.
Also Adobe announced a forthcoming iPad version of Photoshop for next year and Clip Studio Paint is already out and is also a full fledged app. On top of that, Procreate is awesome.
If I were you, I'd go purchase Affinity Photo instead. It is almost exactly like Photoshop with some bonuses. No subscription, costs only $50, and it has a amazing community around it.
You should honestly take a look at Affinity Photo. I had the same problem with Adobe's licensing (paid for CS6, they changed my license to an "upgrade" instead because I used a wacom voucher, and I was unable to install it ever again).
It's 50$, it handles ABR files and most photoshop filters, has support for Filterforge 6+, and is really fast:
https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
as a professional digital artist, Affinity Photo is the ONLY program I've used that can actually go toe-to-toe with Photoshop
I have no current experience with GIMP, but in the past (several years ago) it seemed to be not very well optimized for multi core at some operations. It was a bit better when running it on Linux, but still not that great.
If you want to avoid Adobe, try Affinity Photo. It's very well done, has a lot of features, is cheap, and a one-time-purchase. (They offer a free trial on the page.)
Edit: fixed link, and there's also Affinity Designer with focus on design. Also great app.
Affinity photo. Not free but cheap. Not sure if polarr does compositing (combining photos and removing objects etc). Affinity photo does.
If you need free. Gimp
I would highly recommend Affinity Photo which is $50 (no-subscription). It has a RAW develop module which then imports directly into the traditional photo editing module. You can do photo stacking, HDR merging, focus merging, panoramas, tone mapping, etc. I've tried a number of free, open-source software options, but I don't feel any are as good as Affinity. When I first started photography I didn't appreciate the importance of post-processing, so spending money on editing software didn't seem necessary. Knowing what I do now, it's really just as important as taking the photo. If you're looking for software that does digital media management as well as raw editing I would suggest checking out ACDSee Ultimate 10 ($69) or ON1 Photo RAW ($99).
My current workflow is to import everything into ACDSee Ultimate 10 which is my primary digital asset manager, and then I'll do most of my editing in the raw developer. If I want to make further edits that require more complicated masking, tone/color correction, HDR, panormas, etc. I'll then export to Affinity Photo.
You could consider Affinity Photo. They just released a Windows version and a major update. https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
Very cheap, and I'm 99% sure it should be capable of doing all of the above. I used the beta, I haven't personally used the latest version though.
As an alternative, there is Affinity Photo which started on Mac, but has recently been ported to PC. While it doesn't duplicate Photoshops features 100%, the features they have implemented (and they continue to add new ones) are just done better. An example is layer effects. In PS, you can't see what it looks like without applying the effect. In AP, you can see the effect by scrolling through the selections without applying. And it is $50, no subscription.
I recommend checking out Affinity Designer and/or Affinity Photo. I've found Designer to be a great replacement for Illustrator and combined with Pixelmator haven't missed the Adobe suite. Don't have any experience with Photo but have heard great things about it as well.
I really like Affinity Photo, and there's a beta for Windows. Not free, but relatively cheap?
Other than play around and practice, I'm not sure about tips. Learn the interface, and learn to tweak it to your liking. Learning common key combinations helps speed up the process. Almost every menu item has a purpose, YouTube is generally a good place to learn them.
A $20 monthly subscription to Photoshop would probably make the most since for a photography program. If you're looking for something without a monthly subscription there's a company called Affinity that makes a photo editing program for a flat rate of $50. It is currently only for Mac, but they have plans to release a Windows version, although I'm not sure how close to releasing it they are. https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
I find myself using Pixelmator more and more.
http://www.pixelmator.com/mac/
It's the closest thing I have found. The newest CC update changed the healing brush and now it "bruises" everything. So I am hopping between the two. Muscle memory, no actions and a smaller liquefy brush are the reasons I can't switch yet. I do post for a living FWIW.
EDIT: Ah Crap, meant Affinity Photo. This one can also process RAWs and such. Pixelmator is good and I use it but this is what I was talking about.
That's why I switched to Serif......they've come a long way in recent years with their affinity products. They're 55 bucks buy to own for each app (photo, publisher, designer). Well worth it if you can adjust/don't mind adjusting your workflow from photoshop.
Obligatory “don’t buy photoshop” opportunity, and maybe consider Affinity instead:
https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/ https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/designer/
Both usually go on sale for $25 (perpetual, not a subscription) each almost every holiday. Also not predatory bloatware.
Check out Affinity. They have apps for IOS and your PC. One time cost so you have to have keep filling the pockets of Adobe every month.
Yes. It is called Affinity Photo. Unfortunately it is an iPad / Mac only app, but I’d still highly recommend it as it is the best alternative to photoshop in features, speed, and it’s a much cheaper one time purchase. If you’d prefer to edit on mobile only, Lightroom will do just about everything you could ask for color wise. That’s what I use anyway. 😀
I strongly recommend Affinity Photo. Normally I despise shills, or shilling in general, but I can't get over it. It's a competent product offered for a fair fixed rate, and isn'anti-consumer as all hell. The largest reason I advocate for it is this which is sad only in how rare this is. Especially with software. For $50, you get a lifetime license, and it's compatible with PSDs. It has flaws, but for $50 it comes really close to Photoshop and blows things like GIMP and Painet.NET out of the water. I dumped Adobe two years ago and never looked back.
Pros: If you want to learn Photoshop as an end in itself, go for it. It's professional level software. If you get good at it, you can put it on your resume. There are tons of inexpensive and free tutorials online.
Cons: Photoshop is rather over-engineered for simple photo editing. It has tools for typography, offset printing, web development, video, graphics, and more. Over the years, it has become something like bloatware. The learning curve is relatively steep. Even as a user for 20+ years, I still learn new things about it.
Recommendation: If all you really want to do is edit photos, I'd try Affinity Photo first. My second recommendation would be Adobe Lightroom. Some people like Pixelmator, as well, but I know nothing about it.
If you're looking for a robust Photoshop alternative for Windows or Mac, check out Affinity Photo:
https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
Last Black Friday season it was half price, now it's only 30% off, but still a bargain at forty bucks.
>Any other good promos for self-published authors?
Sure! Affinity is running a sale as well. It's a great piece of software for those who want nearly all of the power of Photoshop but don't want to pay a subscription fee to use Adobe products. Or those looking for a better interface than something like GIMP or more customization potential than something like Canva.
If hou ever want to get your kid a real photoshop program, affinity photo is a one time fee of 50 dollars as opposed to stupid Adobe’s stupid subscription based setup.
Here's a tip for you.
XNView is free. https://www.xnview.com/en/
And Affinity Photo cost $50 perpetual but sometimes on sale at half off. https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
I know they will require time to learn and I know it won't be the same as Lightroom.
But if you are stuck using a really old app because the company will charge you more than you feel is reasonable. It is time to support other companies that are being reasonable.
I saw another redditor suggested Photopea, which is a solid option, but I wanted to offer some other options.
I'd suggest taking a look at GIMP to see if the features you need are there. I'm not sure what adjustments you're referring to, but there's a decent chance GIMP or one of its plugins can be of service. Plus, it's free and open source.
Another option to consider is Affinity Photo. It's probably the most viable professional alternative to PhotoShop, is affordably priced, and has a lifetime license that ensures you every update until 2.0 (which, as far as I'm aware, is still a long way off).
Affinity Photo is for you. https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/ Pretty affordable, and no subscription.
Alternatively on Mac there is Pixelmator but considering the sub I doubt it's your platform of choice.
I was inspired by u/senseofphysics edit posted here a few days ago to make a purple Ridley edit of the Super Metroid cover for my collection. I think the edit was a great idea and I like the work you did on your edit. I used a larger version of the retail box art and did a lot of healing work on the scan of it, I also wanted to give some constructive criticism;
While the edit is solid and achieves it's goal, I noticed that some of the color bleeds into areas on the subject that it technically shouldn't. I also noticed that some of the shading turned white-ish, I don't know exactly how you made yours, but it looks like you made a selection and made a curves adjustment layer. Might I propose a different method?
When I need to recolor something I usually start by isolating my subject(s) and making clone layers from the selections. Then I refine those layers, how can vary but I usually use the pen tool then erase outside of the refinement. Using my selection layer, I make a new blank layer inside of a group and apply the selection as a mask to that group. Then I fill the empty layer in that group with the desired color. The most important part is the blend mode though, for this edit I used Hue. This can vary depending on several factors and Color or Overlay may yield similar or better results.
Source(s): * The original image is from The Cover Project. * Made with Affinity Photo.
Metroid ® is property of Nintendo® (All rights reserved).
©1986-2021 Nintendo®
This image was made for private use, and I have no affiliation with Nintendo® or any of it's subsidiaries.
After many years, I have finally been able to recreate one of my most favored emblems from gaming. I have always wanted to make this and after many years in digital art and design I have finally culminated all of the things I know so far to tackle this project. Pictured is the recreation, various steps of the process, a 4K render, and an alternate version I made. Some minor creative liberties were taken, but I kept this mostly faithful to the render by Retro Studios.
Shoutout to Ray3D from Team MPR for helping with the steel texture.
Source(s): * The logo is a hand-made recreation of Samus' emblem using vectors. * Made with Affinity Photo.
Metroid ® is property of Nintendo® (All rights reserved).
©1986-2021 Nintendo®
This image was made for private use, and I have no affiliation with Nintendo® or any of it's subsidiaries.
Affinity Photo Is pretty damn great, you guys. It does everything I need it to do and it has an active user base of people making tutorials on YouTube.
Available on Mac, Windows, iOS. They are still on this sale thing where they are selling it for 50% off during the pandemic. Not sure how much longer it will last. The Mac and PC versions have a trial period, too.
I also hear their Designer vector program is great. And they make some kind of publisher application.
You have to buy separate copies per each platform but they are not subscription based! Updates released regularly.
I've used Photoshop for over a decade and I can barely manage GIMP. I'm really not a fan of it.
I'd recommend Affinity Photo, it's normally $50 (on sale right now!) and can do most of what you care about with using Photoshop. My dungeon master friend got it for his tasks and I was able to walk him through using it even though I've never used it before.
Unfortunately, I never used Photoshop Elements. What I personally love using in photoshop is the content aware filter to remove certain elements and the healing brush for removing pimples - it's just one click and working amazingly.
I have no idea if these smart features are inside the elements version. Instead of this you might also have a look at Affinity Photo, this is my software of choice (if there is not a paid project where I rely on these smart photoshop features)
https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
They currently are in sale, so it's a great opportunity.
​
GIMP works for many things pretty well. But personally, I am waiting until non destructive editing is possible.
The Gimp is pretty wonky still. I would recommend Affinity Photo as a solid Photoshop replacement. https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
Has good color management and a solid, easy to understand UI, unlike The Gimp. We use it in the studio quite a bit.
Maybe get him a subscription for some online photography courses? Or a subscription to photo editors like Photoworks or Affinity. A gaming mouse or a headset will do, but it would be better to ask him first, if he needs that. As for the fashion, maybe a gift card of his favorite store?
If you specifically need Adobe Photoshop, and only Photoshop, the cheapest option is the Photography Plan. It is 10$/month.
I strongly recommend against CS6 (it would also be hard to find a truly legit copy). By now it is severely outdated (~12 years old?). It is no longer supported or receiving updates from Adobe. Whatever OS update you install next month might prevent it from working, forcing you to use an older operating system.
It also doesn't support things like interface scaling (high resolution/4k/retina monitors).
---
If 10$/month subscription is too expensive for you, then I suggest you instead look at Affinity Photo. It is a professional raster image editor very similar to Photoshop. ~$50 one-time purchase. Modern code base. Very powerful. It even has a bunch of features Photoshop is lacking. Also available on iPad.
i'm a freelance photographer and i find affinity photo to be comparable in almost every way. i use lightroom on my ipad but on a desktop i find affinity to be the best option.
Not sure what you consider cheap, but here are some ideas...
First off, Photoshop Elements is only $59 on sale (ends 9/7)... much cheaper than the stock CC version of Photoshop, and you don't need a subscription. It might work for you if you don't need the pro CC features.
Second, Affinity Photo is only $50. I don't use it, but I do use Affinity Designer, which is their equivalent of Adobe Illustrator and I like the product very much. Assuming the quality is similar, Affinity Photo is a possibility.
And lastly, many people swear by Gimp, which is open source and free.
What. Operating. System. Do. You. Use?
For Mac, Windows, and iPad, check out Affinity Photo. It's not free, but it's reasonably priced and not a subscription.
Thanks everyone for the suggestions. I just ran across Affinity Photo. It might be a good option if you're a mac user. https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
Photoshop is only available as a subscription unless you buy Photoshop Elements, which is a stripped-down garbage version. If you want a full-featured raster image editor for a one-time payment, try Affinity Photo.
There's a $10/month annual subscription for Photoshop and Lightroom. There's a $20/mo plan that just includes more cloud storage. Adobe also has $21/mo (with annual sub) and $32/mo (actual monthly, no annual sub) plans for each individual app they make. If you're going to get PS, get the $10/mo plan.
Yes, if you get an annual-paid-monthly plan and cancel early, you have to pay the remaining annual cost (although Adobe support might cut you some slack if you really plead with them?).
If you don't want a subscription-based app, Affinity Photo is a one-time purchase, offered recently at half price for only $25. Photopea.com is an online Photoshop clone. GIMP is a free, open-source photo editor.
I second u/yyytttyyyttt . Adobe, unfortunately, join in way to late in to the IPad world. And as you could probably tell they aren't doing so good (Adobe Photoshop for IPad). As there apps simply lack most of the pro tools that you would really need to get started on the IPad. Affinity, however, started early in the game, and because of that, there apps are way more advance. So you can give Affinity Photo a try while you wait for Adobe to catch up. And as mentioned by u/yyytttyyyttt they are subscription free. Only a one-time payment of $20 USD. And if it helps, they do have a desktop version for Windows and Mac for only $50 USD.
I’ve been using Affinity products for a couple of years now, starting with Photo for iOS. There’s something really awesome about taking photos on a trip and then editing them on a iPad in a hotel room or in the airport.
I don’t do any professional work, but I’ve gladly given Serif about $200 for their apps. And now I own them. I’m not renting them. They do have a free trial, too: https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
I am a little surprised when people ask software questions without mentioning their OS these days. Are you using an iPad? Windows? Android? Something else?
Affinity Photo is available for Mac, Windows, and iPad:
A reasonable point. If you're not too deep in the Photoshop weeds than a 50 dollar license to Affinity Photo might do the trick.
Capture One is definitely not a Photoshop competitor. It does have much more granular adjustment layer editing than Lightroom though.
Affinity Photo for editing RAW (basically a Photoshop alternative), very affordable and for me as an amateur it has everything I need. They also have decent tutorials for beginners and there is also a good iPad version.
It doesn't have the library management features of lightroom though.
I used Gimp a couple times but i have to admit i never really learned to use it.
I did most of my editing in Lightroom and since about 1.5 years in Capture One Pro. I only use Affinity for about 5% of my editing time, since most of the time Capture One is enough.
I find Affinity way more user friendly to work with than Gimp (This could vary a lot since you know Gimp probably way better).
"Special" tools i used that are great IMO:
- Focus Stacking, Panorama Stitching, Macros, split toning
Probably the best you can do is download the free trial and try for yourself (scroll all the way down):
https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
​
| Affinity Photo | Very user-friendly, fairly new but steadily catching up to Photoshop in terms of features. | $49 USD |
|---|---|---|
| GIMP | Not very user-friendly, but has most of what the average user might need for photo/image editing. Unfortunately lacks nondestructive adjustments. | Free and Open Source |
| Krita | User-friendly, more art-oriented than Photoshop but still has the tools for basic photo editing. Includes methods for using nondestructive filters, adjustments, and layer styles. | Free and Open Source |
All of these programs are available on OSX and Windows, while GIMP and Krita can also be used on Linux. Each has support for the PSD format, Affinity being the winner in terms of compatibility there.
It’s not free, but Affinity Photo is extremely nice and costs a one-time $50 fee instead of $120/year. Just so you and passersby know that there is a reasonable middle ground between GIMP and Photoshop.
For people who use Windows who want meat and potatoes (not a lot of bells and whistles) image editing with layers, I can recommend Paint.NET.
For those looking for a rather inexpensive (not completely free) solution as a Photoshop replacement, I can recommend Affinity Photo --they also have Affinity Designer which is good for those who want an inexpensive Illustrator replacement. Note these are not subscription-based.
For those creating game content, I highly recommend Blender. I'm anxiously awaiting the release of 2.8 and the UI redesign seems a lot more modern and in-line with a lot of other apps these days. If you want to create and rig models for your apps, it's an excellent free solution, but it does so many other things well and is a contender with the higher-priced packages in its own right.
Not free but very cheap to the alternative. There is an Adobe alternative for these three - Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign. Made by Affinity. No subscriptions. I actually like Affinity Photo better than Adobe Photoshop in a lot of ways.
Affinity Photo https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/desktop/
Affinity Designer https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/designer/desktop/
Affinity Publisher https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/publisher/
Affinity Photo is a good Adobe Photoshop alternative.
Affinity Designer is a good Adobe Illustrator alternative. (For vector work)
I would think that most bang for the buck right now till next week-end. Is Microsoft's i5/8gb/128gb with free Platinum Keyboard cover for $799.
If mainly about the Art then hands down iPad 2018 + Apple Pencil $429. As between illustration with Affinity Designer & Affinity Photo with Procreate makes for a pretty compact powerful Artist tablet solution. Tho for me find the 10.5" Pro a tad better for art.
Check out Affinity Designer and Affinity Photo as well (whichever one is more relevant for what you are looking for)
From what I've heard Adobe has plans to roll out a full version of Photoshop for iPads, but I'm unsure if that's confirmed or not.
There's a few alternatives you could use, but the only one which is both fully featured and available on the iPad would be Affinity Photo in place of Photoshop, and Affinity Designer in place of Illustrator.
It's not too much of a transition if you're already comfortable with Adobe's products, and both of these can use all the same file formats you'd normally work with, you can even import and export PSD files. Personally, I prefer Adobe products but Affinity's offerings are damn good.
well, for $35 (limited time offer now that I just checked their website.) I use Affinity Photo/Designer for all my needs.
Closely comparable to photoshop/illustrator
You need a program that will do photo stacking such as Photoshop or Affinity Photo. With either program you can import the group of photos and it will automatically align them, creating a single image which will have reduced noise levels. Here is a tutorial on how to do it in Affinity; also the program is on sale right not for $35 which is a steal for everything it does.
For RAW editing I'd also recommend looking into affinity photo. It's in between lightroom and photoshop from a capability standpoint, but a one time $50 charge instead of a monthly recurring fee. I actually prefer the UI to Photoshop in some ways tbh.
Look in to Affinity Photo. For $50 (for a permanent license) it essentially has all the capabilities of Photoshop (you rent it for $100 per year) at a small fraction of the cost.
Affinity are series of software developed by the Serif company. For Photoshop alternative, Affinity Photo is the closest there is. RAW-editing, color space support (RGB, LAB, CMYK, Grayscale), PSD compatibility, filters found in raw processing programs, nondestructive editing, transform mask, smudge, and so on. They also offer Affinity Designer, and will release Publisher too.
I can't remember what our host used to make our banner, but I believe a program like GIMP would work well. If you wanna invest in a program, I believe this one is a good option:
https://affinity.serif.com/en-us/photo/
Our host has mentioned this one before. It might actually be what he used for our banner.
You can also use something more basic like Microsoft Paint.
As much as I love to support open source, Gimp is no replacement.
Affinity Photo is way better than Photoshop in every way. Modern codebase, better workflows, every individual tool is done better. Photoshop relies on its monopoly and hasn't had a good reason to evolve for a decade.
I'm not a fan of the monthly subscription model for Adobe Lightroom, so I use ACDSee Ultimate 10 for digital asset management and most of my editing. Anything that requires more advanced correction I'll take into Affinity Photo.