If you use Photoshop regularly, check out the just released version 3.0 of Paint.NET (download it here). It is 3.6 MB download that handles most of the basic (and many of the advanced) functions of Photoshop. It’s free, and even better it loads in just a couple of seconds on a newish Windows PC. I tested it, and it does everything that I need – if it was usable on a Mac I’d switch from Photoshop based on the speed of the application alone. Earlier versions of Paint.NET were apparently very sluggish – but I can confirm that version 3.0 is very quick to load and very responsive in basic testing. Robert Scoble gives it a thumbs up, too, although he’s clearly been drinking all night. In fact, after reading his post I’m going to open a bottle of scotch, too. 
The real test is whether or not Paint.NET can do something like this.
Its a excellent tool for people looking for a alternative and who don’t require all the advanced features of photoshop. The best part is its Free.
Photoshop is effectively free too – I don’t know anyone who’s paid for it (exept me of course). I think the best part is that it’s fast. I spend a lot of time in Photoshop every day and the load time kills me.
Boo, it won’t install on my rig.
Just looked at their site. v3.0 is still Alpha 1. Current release is 2.72.
anyone know how this compares w/ GIMP?
paint.net application will not be develope in a future.
It’s good to see .Net desktop applications are coming of age now. Whenever someone ask about .Net on the desktop or if .Net is slow, I just point them to Paint.Net.
LOL @ Mike’s comment.
Try installing rotor or mono and then paint.net should work smoothly.
@Michael
Load time? You mean once when you first open it? That ruins the experience?
I didn’t know Scoble was a photographer. Have any real photographers given it a “thumbs up”?
Wait a minute…
“I’m going to open a bottle of scotch”
That’s a bad choice, you should have said bourbon.
Michael, try Seashore for OS X. It loads almost instantaneously on my machine.
I have some complaints with it (resizing images is not incredibly intuitive) but overall, it’s nice for some quick image manipulation.
No RAW processing, not interested. Cool for people who like / want / need free though.
Nothing compare to GIMP…
Unless you need something useful
It does not the 1/10th of what Photoshop can do, but it’s a good free app.
The only real problem is that you can only work on one picture, no multi-document support… and that’s crap.
What a rude little program- I haven’t even used it yet, and already it’s been calling mummy and daddy without my permission.
Seriously, though- flipping the counter over on your server should be a voluntary thing. To shame.
The multi document is now a feature in version 3.0.
Works great.
This could have been written in Java and then anybody could use it. I use Mac and Linux and would love something light and crisp. You made that impossible by using dot net.
Why did you write it using MS proprietary languages? You cut off a host of users for no reason, you fell into the MS trap. Please reconsider your choice of programming platforms and port this to Java instead.
Thanks much!
Good post. I’ll check it out on Monday. I don’t have a PC with me. I used GIMP as an alternative to PS, but it turned out to be slow and resource consuming.
> Johannes Rex
Well, not exactly.
.net platform is not proprietary: it is an ECMA standard (and open).
Java is proprietary and has just begun to be open.
The thing is that MS does not provide a VM for non MS OS, but Mono is a quite good replacement.
Yeah, 3MB if you already have the .NET Framework (another 20mb+). But yeah, it’s a nice little app. for a slower PC’s with little RAM, but I wouldn’t even put this and PS in the same category.
I’ve been using it for simple image resizing.
YAY! I always need things like this for my work. Thank you!
Paint.net is hardly a replacement for Photoshop. Rather, it fulfils a different need.
My image editing repertoire looks something like this:
Photoshop – Serious photo manipulation used for creating art.
Photo.net – Simple lightweight quick image editing tool.
Picasa – Catalogue and management of images, bulk basic processing.
Photo.net has it’s place and does a great job at it. I’ve been using it on and off for basic image manipulation and have always liked it (it’s leaps and bounds more intuitive than gimp too).
It’s good to see that Photo.net is much faster than it used to be and that if finally supports multiple images (I wish they’d get this going in MDI).
-dg
Another vote for Seashore (http://seashore...sourceforge.net) on Mac OS X — open source (GPLv2), Intel native, and always good enough for me.
Another good one on mac is chocoflop. It’s still a beta but it’s very mac like (CoreImage based). You need a good graphics card to run it.
http://www.chocoflop.com/
I tried out seashore for the mac and didn’t care for it – it’s not nearly powerful enough. I’m currently using GimpShop which I like a lot more.
I’m loving this, good call TC.
GIMP’s UI is awful. Go with Paint.NET instead.
It is no more than an image viewer. As for that, I recommend InfoView (I am not sure about the name). It is too quick to say that it can “handles most of the basic functions of Photoshop”. Look at the “Effect” menu. That is where you can apply effect quickly to your photo or image. Photoshop has about 100 selection. Paint.Net has 10. Paint.Net basically build a framework which should be very easy given current status of software developmemt. What it lacks is the most important feature that people would like to pay hundreds of dallors. That is the kernel of Computer Graphics Algorithm.
Paint.Net is just a Net program. Photoshop is Compute Graphics Software. That is the difference.
For a computer software, if you price it $10 and no one want to buy it because it does not worth it or there is comparable free bees, it is a failure. Paint.Net certainly fall in this catogary.
It is too often for people in the “Free” domain to claim that “we can do the same thing with much less and for free”. But what end up is just a bunch of garbage.
If you build a trans-pacific cabel but do not link it to each family because “it is too easy and every one knows how to do it”, it is still garbage.
Its sweet that Paint.Net is open source as it allows specialized applications to implement many of these features in specialized software. I look forward to getting my hands on 3.0 when the final release is made.
I like your picture of Seattle in this page … is it available somewhere ?
(my email address is pierre(dot)seattle(@)ouvaton(dot)org if you find the time to send it to me)
I looked for it in your album in flickr but didn’t find it … but I found other beautiful pictures of Seattle that you may want to check here : http://seattlef...topic.php?t=203 …
Hmm, i clicked on Update on my 2.x version and it didn’t detect the new version. Am I required to download the whole new 3.0 version?
the 3.0 is still in the alpha phase, so a manual download is required. It will uninstall the previous installed version.
This may be the slowest application I’ve ever used. I actually fell asleep waiting for it to load. That’s .NET for you I suppose. If he’d written it in C++, Delphi or VB6 then it may actually have been usable.
hehe lol, nice, maybe you should rewrite it in C++ it.
I use Photoshop on my Mac, but when I need something to do a quick edit on the PC, I’ve found the editor that comes with SnagIt (screen capture application) to more than suffice. No layering, compositing, etc. But some basic color correction/resizing/manipulation and export/import to a variety of formats. That’s usually all I need. It’s not free, but it’s cheap enough.
Its a nice little program. Loads really fast. But it lacks a lot of features that I;ve got used to in Photoshop. Layers feature is horrible. But you cant complain when it’s free
There’s a real software gem called photofiltre..
http://www.photofiltre.com/
Though it’s intented called an ‘image retouching tool’, it has many masques , filters and brushes that are in the photoshop realm. Great plugins also.
Free too.
Ever heard of the Gimp?
i gave it up when requiring Microsoft .NET Framework to run it.
Paint.net and GIMP both seem to be missing my favorite PS tool – SLICE!
Photoshop is overkill just for Web graphics. You would rather want to compare Paint.NET to ImageReady or Fireworks, which still beat it hands down in terms of features. Can’t argue with the price though.
If you want something that replaces Photoshop on the cheap and does a decent job of it, I suggest you look closely at Pixel.
http://www.kanz...xel/?page_id=12
It’s currently beta, free to try out and can be pre-ordered for $32. It works on every OS you know of and appears to have ripped off Photoshop completely in terms of user interface and features.
Has potential though, and the free beta is definitely worth checking out.
Great plugins . Manda wallpapers r avalible at http://www.vistafeel.com
I have photoshop cs, and I like it but, like Michael said, the load time is irritating, plus on my at least 5-year-old, 256MB ram laptop trying to use it while running foobar and firefox gets REALLY slow.
I wanted to try paint.net cause I don’t use the advanced photoshop stuff, mainly paintbrush, airbrush, dodge, burn and the occasional clone stamp or layer effect, and I heard it was fast (and the unlimited undo was intriguing) but installing this whole .net framework is a serious pain in my crack. Especially since I literally just cleared a bunch of space off my hard drive and was feeling proud of myself.
With all the crap .net is taking up I figure I might as well reinstall and learn to use The Gimp. This program better be fantastic! It’s taking hours to get this done.
Took me 3 hours to fully install everything (it helps that I ran into four unexpected errors in a row). Played around with it for 20 minutes and decided it sucks.
It doesn’t really have anything I need. I cold live without the dodge tool, but no polygonal lasso, basically one brush with a bunch of lame patterns, opacity adjustment and blending are laughable, It’s crap. Although it does have it’s good points, it actually is pretty fast, the general user interface is enjoyable, I love its gradient tool and how all the sub-window things turn translucent. but that’s about it.
It’s like a step up from mspaint. Ok, a big step; or two, but it’s way behind photoshop as far as making digital paintings goes and ranks barely above dogwaffle in my book.
Although dogwaffle has a way better name.