Mac Free Alternative To Photoshop

1. Mac Free Alternative To Photoshop Brushes
2. Adobe Photoshop Alternative Mac
3. Alternative To Photoshop Mac

• January 02, 2020
• 18 min to read

Perhaps the most well known Photoshop alternative, GIMP has been around for ages and is one of the first programs that comes to mind for many people when they think 'free Photoshop.' It's an open. As GIMP is powerful and adaptable, GIMP is the best of the free Photoshop alternatives in my opinion. It comes with layers, masks, advanced filters, colour adjustment tools and transformations. These are customisable, which already makes it better than Photoshop. Photoshop has customisability in its panels, but there lies its limitations.

Most free photo editors available on the App Store are quite basic, offering just a limited number of filters and allowing you to easily and quickly liven up your photos before posting them on social media.

But if you're an aspiring or professional photographer, you probably need a more powerful app with a broader set of tools to use your creativity to the fullest. Besides, you probably use your Mac for photo editing because working on a large screen makes it possible to adjust the slightest details.

1. Apple's Photos (Built-in app)

Apple's Photos app is included for free on all recently released Macs. It does a good job at organizing your photos, but its collection of photo enhancement tools leaves much to be desired. Hopefully, our selection of the best free programs for photo editing on Mac will help you choose the right app to suit all your creative needs.

2. Luminar (7 days trial)

Luminar is another full-featured photo editor that's popular with both Mac and Windows users. It can work as a standalone app as well as a plugin for such popular programs as Apple Photos.

Luminar uses Artificial Intelligence to enable sophisticated yet quick photo enhancements. Among these AI features are Sky Enhancer, which adds more depth and detail to the sky in your photos while leaving other areas untouched; Accent AI, which analyzes a photo and automatically applies the best combination of different effects to enhance your image; and Sun Rays, which allows you to place an artificial sun and adjust the lighting to your liking or make the sun rays already in your photo look even more incredible.

Luminar has over 60 filters you can apply to your photos to enhance them in a moment. Luminar also provides a set of powerful tools for cropping, transforming, cloning, erasing, and stamping, along with layers, brushes, and many more incredible features. Luminar supports the Touch Bar on the latest MacBook Pro, making photo editing even more effortless and pleasing.

3. Photolemur 3 (Free Version with watermark)

Photolemur is a relative newcomer on the photo editing market but it has all the chances to win the favor of beginner photographers and hobbyists. Running on Artificial Intelligence, Photolemur is a completely automatic photo enhancer, meaning that it does all the editing for you in no time. It has the simplest interface, with only a few buttons and sliders to adjust the enhancement to your liking and view the before and after results.

All you need to do is choose a photo (or a few) that you want to improve, drag and drop or import them using the Import button, and let the program make enhancements. After it's done, you can compare the edited version with the original image by using the before–after slider and, if you want, adjust the skin tone or even enlarge the eyes using additional sliders. Pretty easy, huh?

Photolemur also offers a number of impressive styles to touch up your photos and give them a sophisticated and professional look. With this app, you don't need to stuff your head with photo editing nuances and terms. Just run Photolemur and watch the magic happen!

4. Aurora HDR (14 days trial)

As you probably can tell from the name, Aurora HDR is designed to help photographers enhance their HDR photos, making them even more detailed and beautiful. It's an ideal tool for editing your photos, with an extensive collection of more than 20 tools including details, tone, mapping, color, glow, and vignette. Each tool has its unique selection of controls to adjust its effects.

Aurora HDR enables you to work with brushes, layers, and masks, and provides a number of automatic AI tools for recognizing and removing noise, enhancing colors, lighting, and details, improving clarity, and adding contrast to dull areas while leaving other areas untouched.

Aurora HDR does a great job dealing with difficult lighting situations and creating full-of-life images while being easy to use.

5. Pixelmator (Trial 30 Days)

Pixelmator is a photo enhancer beloved by many Mac users, as it offers a good combination of a modern and simple interface, the ability to work on multiple layers, and powerful features that take photo editing to a whole new level. With so many editing tools, brushes, and effects, you can enhance your photos to your liking. You can choose between two versions of Pixelmator – standard and pro – depending on your needs. The standard version is great for basic photo editing with its selection of essential tools and filters, while the pro version is packed with extra brushes, tools, and effects that let you push your creativity to new boundaries. You can decide which version is suitable for you according to what features you're looking for in a photo editing app.

6. Adobe Photoshop Elements 2020 (Trial link)

Photoshop Elements isn't as affordable as other photo enhancers for beginner photographers. But luckily there's a trial version available, so you can check it out before deciding whether this app is worthy of your money. Photoshop Elements acquired many powerful features from Photoshop, only Elements is simplified for amateur photographers and enthusiasts. It includes a good number of effects and filters, plus automated editing options for improving lighting, color balance, and exposure, and even opening closed eyes and reducing the effects of camera shake.

In addition to all of these awesome features, Photoshop also offers editing modes for beginners, intermediate users, and experts. Beginners will probably prefer Quick mode, as it focuses on essential tools to quickly enhance your photos by improving color, lighting, and other basic settings. Guided mode provides intermediate users with step-by-step guidance with more professional features like artistic effects, skin tone correction, and background replacement. Expert mode gives you full access to the app's really powerful editing features and is ideal for creating stunning images.

7. Affinity Photo (Free Trial)

Affinity Photo's interface may seem overwhelming at first, especially for novices, but when you come to grips with it you'll find that the app is just what you've been looking for. Its numerous professional tools, effects, and filters encourage you to get creative with your photos. Among the coolest features Affinity Photo has to offer is a before and after view to compare the original photo with its edited version.

Affinity Photo works with 15 file types, including common ones like PDF, PSD, JPG, and GIF as well as some less popular ones. The app amazes with its abundance of basic and top-notch editing tools, allowing you to tweak your photos using all possible kinds of instruments. Affinity Photo allows you to edit HDR photos, apply artistic filters and effects, play with masks and layers, and create breathtaking compositions by combining several images in one. If you find its interface a bit much and are afraid of getting lost in all those advanced tools, you should probably look for something more suitable for your level. But Affinity Photo is worth mastering.

8. Google Photos

Google Photos is a popular cloud storage service for photos and videos. It can't boast countless masterly tools like other photo enhancers that we review in this article, but it includes some fundamental features like filters, color adjustment sliders, and transformation tools.

Although Google Photos may not be that helpful when it comes to editing photos, it does a pretty good job at storing high-resolution images and videos with 15GB of free online storage, compared to iCloud's mere 5GB (which you can upgrade to 50GB for a monthly fee). If you're planning to go on a trip and take plenty of photos, then it might be smart to sign up for Google Photos to use that extra storage space when you come back.

9. PhotoScape X (Free)

A relatively new photo editing app, PhotoScape X has been gaining popularity with many Mac and PC users since its release in 2008. Its interface is simple but unconventional, with a number of tabs running along the top of the window. Each is responsible for a specific stage of editing. The Viewer tab allows you to browse and organize your photos. After you pick a photo, you can switch to the Editor tab, which includes a broad set of instruments, filters, and effects and a useful feature that enables you to compare the adjusted photo with the original.

The next tabs, including the Batch tab, mainly concentrate on editing and renaming multiple photos at once. The GIF tab allows you to easily create an animated GIF from a group of selected photos.

The downside of PhotoScape X is a lack of selection tools, so all changes are applied to the whole image rather than to a selected part.

Mac nc35 foundation swatches. 10. Gimp (Free)

Gimp is a free open-source photo editing app that has been on the market for over 22 years and is available for Windows, Mac, and even Linux. Unlike many free apps, Gimp doesn't have any ads or in-app purchases. Its grey interface might seem a little old-fashioned and it may be a bit sluggish when it comes to complex effects, though.

Gimp offers a vast collection of advanced tools that hardly any free photo editor can boast. It has numerous enhancement options such as clone and heal brushes, layers and channels, accurate selection tools, a number of transformation instruments, and, of course, color adjustment controls. Gimp is one of the most powerful tools for enhancing photos and is beloved by so many users for its price (free) and versatility. But if you can't come to grips with Gimp's interface, it may be worth paying some cash for a more user-friendly program.

Touted as the most popular digital imaging & graphic designing software in the world, Photoshop is an industry standard. Which means everybody wants a slice, except at a hefty price of subscription and/ or monthly payment.

When planning to migrate from Adobe Photoshop to alternative software, make sure they are free and worth. But what if users could buy an alternative option for, hold your horses, free? With photo edits, logo generation and professional graphic designing all available on our system, without burning a hole in the pocket, here are ten powerful free alternative to Adobe Photoshop which are free to use for home and commercial purpose.

10 Free Photoshop Alternatives

GIMP

Released in 1996, GNU image manipulation program is a multi platform supported, free, open source image machinator that is used for art creation, animation, image editing and enhancement with features like layers, filters, gradients amongst others. It is the most popular free substitute of Photoshop.

FILE SUPPORT: GIMP supports the following file formats in both readable and writable forms: PNG, GIF, JPEG, XPM, TIFF, BMP, SUNRAS. XWD, XBM, , MIFF, XCF, PIX,TGA, FLI, CEL ,SGI, PS, PNM, FITS, , AVI and PCXHRZ.

PROS:

• VERSATILE: Since the program is open source, coders can modify it to suit their requirements, making it highly versatile.
• FLEXIBLE: GIMP offers downloadable free internal plug-ins and allows external plug-ins to operate thereby giving more room for utility flexibility.
• TUTORIALS: Offers extensive tutorials from program basics to photo editing, painting and even
• EASY TO USE: Less complex tools.
• LESSER BUGS: Due to the open source nature of this program its active community constantly spots and fixes errors, thereby reducing the number and time taken to fix the bugs.
• LIGHTWEIGHT: Occupies lesser storage space than Photoshop.

CONS:

• SLOW FEATURE DEVELOPMENT: by-product of being a community program.
• LIMITED CLIENTELE: Useful for beginners and small scale businesses, rather than professional photographers, graphic designers and illustrators.
• NO MOBILE VERSION: As opposed to Photoshop, GIMP is not available for iPhone or android users although an adapted version XGIMP is available on both their app stores.

PLATFORM: Windows, MacOS, Linux, Solaris and BDS.

PRICE: Free

PIXLR

Developed by Autodesk, PIXLR is a free cloud based image editing software which boasts of photo sharing, filters, retouch option, advanced photo editing, manual image adjustments, screen grabber extension and paint from scratch.

FILE SUPPORT: JPEG, PNG,GIF, PSD and BMP.

PROS:

• NO MEMORY SPACE USAGE: There is no need for installing it on the system since it runs solely via a browser thereby occupying zero storage space on the hardware.
• MOBILE VERSION AVAILABLE: On both Google play and apple store with more than 130 million
• SIMPLER, FASTER, MULTILINGUAL INTERFACE.

CONS:

• NO TUTORIALS: Just a help button which incidentally is not of much support.
• LIMITED FILE SUPPORT: As opposed to GIMP, Pixlr offers much fewer file formats.
• LIMITED FEATURES: Suitable for low to medium level editing.
• CONSTRAINTS: Pop up ads and Pre-installation of flash 10 or above required.
• ADJUST IMAGE SIZE TOOL: Gives a blurry image.

PLATFORM: Any OS with a browser.

PRICE: Free.

GETPAINT.NET

An open source advance paint application, this raster graphic files editor has a seamless logical user interface as its biggest USP. This software is more like MS Paint, has more features and easy to use. It comes with several plugins that can enhance the features.

FILE SUPPORT: PDN, BMP, GIF, JPG, PNG, TIFF, TGA and DDS.

Mac Free Alternative To Photoshop Brushes

PROS:

• MULTILINGUAL: Available in 25 languages.
• PLUGIN & HELP: Due to its active online community, tutorials and plug-ins are easily accessible.
• UNLIMITED HISTORY RECORD
• COHERENT INTERFACE

Adobe Photoshop Alternative Mac

CONS:

• LIMITED FUNCTIONS & TOOLS: no Dodge & Burn tool as well as limited Brushing functions.
• Text cannot be edited post application
• Limited filters in comparison to Photoshop
• Requires .NET Framework as a prerequisite.
• Needs at least 200 MB of memory space

PLATFORM: Windows 7 to 10.

PRICE: Free with an option of donation.

KRITA

Released in 2005, Krita is an open source digital art software used essentially for illustration, painting and drawing from scratch. It comes with advance tools like Mirroring, Layer Management, Layer Masks, Color Management and mnay more. The best part is it support PSD files, that means any Photoshop saved file can be edited in Krita software.

FILE SUPPORT:JPEG, PNG, TIFF, JP2, JPEG, ORA , XCF, PPM, GIF, EXR, HEIF, PDF and RAW amongst others.

PROS:

• VARIETY: of brush engines available since it is primarily for digital painting.
• TUTORIALS: Easily accessible training materials.
• SIMPLE LAYOUT: with toolbars homogenous to Photoshop.
• CUSTOMIZABLE: Since it is open source.
• UPDATES &NEW ADD-ONS: Bugs are fixed and new features are added in a hotfoot.

CONS:

• Cannot edit pre existing images.
• No text support for Photoshop PSD files although it can open some of them.

PLATFORM: MacOS, Windows, Linux and Graphic Tablets.

PRICE: Free with an option of donation.

SUMO PAINT

Built in 2008, Sumo paint is an image editing and painting software that works both as an illustrator and Photoshop and is available on cloud as well as for installation on system.

FILE SUPPORT: JPEG, PNG, GIF & SUMO formats.

PROS:

• VAST ART COMMUNITY: of over 4 million members.
• PIXEL EDITING AVAILABLE.
• LAYERING & MASKING FEATURE: for professional level image editing.

CONS:

• No third party plug ins.
• Flash support

PLATFORM: Browser, Desktop, iOS, Android and iPad.

PRICE: Free with an option to upgrade to Pro or Pro Plus at a premium.

FOTOR

Fotor is a coherent, powerful and easy to use photo processing software for graphic designing and image editing. This software canbe use to put wide range of effects. Additionally, Fotor allow to adjust color, size, ligt, and many more, which is very much similar to Irfanview software.

FILE SUPPORT: GIF, JPEG, PNG, RAW, BMP and TIFF.

PROS:

• VARIETY: Design templates, stickers, effects available.
• COLLAGE option available.
• SIMPLE, INTUITIVE & QUICK to use
• BATCH PROCESSING

CONS:

• Not for professional photographers
• RESOLUTION BREAKOUT: post image sharing and editing

PLATFORM: MacOS, Windows & Web based.

PRICE: Free basic version with advanced option for monthly fee.

Try Fotor online

PHOTO POS PRO

Enriched with filters, layers, masks, adjustment, enhancement & drawing tools, Photos Pos Pro is a Pixel based graphic designer and artwork application.

FILE SUPPORT: JPEG, TIFF, JPEG, GIF, RAW and its own format FPOS.

PROS:

• COHESIVE: arrangement of toolbar and menu array
• NOVICE & ADVANCE LAYOUT available
• CUSTOMIZABLE INTERFACE
• PLUGINS AVAILABLE

CONS:

• LIMITED EXPORTED FILE SIZE
• LACK of KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS
• INTERFACE: looks outdated
• NO DODGE AND BURN OPTION

PLATFORM: MacOS, Windows, Linux, IOS, Android.

Alternative To Photoshop Mac

PRICE: Freemium

ADOBE PHOTOSHOP EXPRESS

Developed by Adobe Corporation, Adobe Photoshop express is a sleek browser based flash requiring image editing and collage developing application with the ability to connect to social media platforms.

FILE SUPPORT: JPEG, PNG, TIFF, RAW

PROS:

• DIVERSE: Can be easily supported on systems with weaker specifications.
• INTER- ADOBE INTERACTIVITY: Quite interactive with other adobe products.

CONS:

• Not for professional image retouch
• maximum image resolution of 16mp
• The Mobile version is less intensive than the desktop version.

PLATFORM: Android, iOS & Windows phone & tablets along with Windows desktop and Chromebooks.

PRICE: Freemium

MyPaint

Created in 2004, MyPaint is an open source comprehensive painting software with a gamut of brush configurations and versatility that even uses charcoals, ink, paint and pencil. It does not support image processing.

FILE SUPPORT: ORA, JPEG, and PNG

PROS:

• LIMITLESS CANVAS
• STABLE VERSION FOR LINUX
• LARGE COMMUNITY: of users available on Tumblr and DeviantArt
• EASY TO USE & CLUTTERFREE INTERFACE

CONS:

• NO HELP: Offline tutorials unavailable
• NO PERIODIC DEVELOPMENT
• NO STABLE VERSION: for Windows and Mac users.

PLATFORM: MacOS, Windows, Linux, Browser and Wacom Graphic tablets.

PRICE: Free

PINTA

Released in 2011 with the first stable version, Pinta is a simple open source raster graphics editor inspired by Paint.NET.

FILE SUPPORT: BMP, ICO, ORA, TIFF, JPEG/JPG, TGA and PNG

PROS:

• LIMITLESS UNDO/REDO OPTION
• MULTILINGUAL SUPPORT: 55 languages
• MULTILAYER SUPPORT.

CONS:

• NO BLENDING MODE
• SYSTEM CONSTRAINT: Mono or GTK to be downloaded as prerequisite for Pinta to run

PLATFORM: Linux, Windows, Mac OS

PRICE: Free

So these are the opensource and free similar software to Adobe Photoshop. If you are using any other application to edit images, then let us know by leaving your valueable comment below.