10 Sep 07
Tale of Three Image Editors Apple
Photoshop is currently being given a run for its money, (and anything cheaper than ?569 is worth a look), by three Core Image driven image editors currently in beta or preview release.
Acorn released today, from Flying Meat, a powerful little image editor designed for simple editing, and marketed with the goal of "simplicity". Featuring full layer capabilities, a hefty selection of filters (thanks to Core Magma), Gradients and plugins it packs a lot into a relatively tiny app.
The more I play with the app, the more powerful it proves to be- I can grab images from my iSight, and it also knew that I have the Flickr Uploader application on my mac, and appeared as an option to export to, which was a neat touch.
The application has a really simple UI of just an editor window and a tools menu which It feels very much like GIMP though, which is not necessarily a bad thing. Acorn is available today at an introductory of $39.95.
Next up is Skitch, from plasq. Unlike Acorn, Skitch isn't an image editor per-say- its more of an screenshot/note highlighting application, but for simple image resizing, cropping and annotating it really does it fast. Integrated image uploading to flickr, .mac, ftp or their own free myskitch site makes sharing images really fast. The one window UI is simply gorgeous and quick saving by dragging the image out of the screen onto the desktop is genius!
That said, Skitch isn't Photoshop- and currently has no gradients or filters. My major complaint is that although each eliminate is a layer, the manipulating of them is far from simple- and I really miss the photoshop method of turning on and off layers and rearranging them. However, the "Skitch History" feature is really impressive, and you can pull up any image you have previously manipulated in Skitch and play with it again.
I will admit some bias as I got a beta of this back in June and I really love using Skitch. It is very fast, and has won my heart for quick sketching and resizing pictures but its lack of filters- or true editing capabilities will probably put many people off. Skitch is currently a invite only beta, and no price has been set.
Finally we come to the most promising of the lot. Pixelmator was apparently the darling of WWDC, which does appear to be Photoshop's closest rival. Now I have not been able to have a play with this app, so I am basing my comparison from David Chartier's review on tuaw.
The app is able to create, edit, and enhance still images, and features powerful selection of tools, with layers-based image editing, GPU-powered image processing, colour management, automation, and transparent HUD user interface for work with images.
iSight, and iLife integration, support for more than 100 different file formats, including Photoshop images with layers, 50 Core Image-powered filters, (I am guessing this is the same set of tools that power Acorn), full-screen editing mode... the list is rather extensive.
According to David, "the UI is a gorgeous translucent black, and it really does offer a lot of functionality and innovation aimed squarely at Adobe Photoshop or, perhaps more appropriately, Photoshop Elements."
Starting it up feels light, snappy and fast; easily beating out competitors by a landslide. Beyond its slick UI is a powerful image editor that offers a lot of control over color and selecting specific regions to edit... You can toggle layer visibility on and off, and adding an image lying around on your Mac to a canvas you're already working on is as easy as dragging and dropping from the Finder; even Photoshop CS3 doesn't do basic integration with Mac OS X like this, which is where I think one of Pixelmator's fundamental strengths really shines.
Pixelmator 1.0 was due to be available in late July for $59 (US), but is apparently delayed leading John Gruber to refer to it as "Vaporware"
I don't want to read too much into it, but it's amusing that Pixelmator's?download-able?press images? were created using PhotoshopCS3. + daringfireball.net
Overall, if its speed you want- then Skitch has it. For a true alternative to Photoshop then Pixelmator probably will be the rival, but seeing it is has been delayed and hardly anyone has actually had a play with it, I'm going to say that Gus Mueller's Acorn is simple, powerful and can live in your dock today!