GIMP is the GNU Image Manipulation Program, an open-source image editor preferred by illustrators, graphic designers, and photographers worldwide. Offering various features like photo enhancement, customizable interface, and crop tools, it saves costs with no subscription charges. Some users find its interface complex, and partial compatibility with Adobe files. Developed in 1995 by Spencer Kimball and Peter Mattis as part of the GNU software collection, GIMP supports multiple file formats and is available on various platforms.
Seeking options beyond GIMP? Look into Photoshop, CorelDRAW, Lightroom, Illustrator, Procreate, Canva, Affinity, Elements, Clip Studio Paint, Inkscape, and more for your editing needs.
Photoshop
Enter the world of Photoshop, an iconic software developed by Adobe dedicated to image creation, graphic design, and photo editing. With its roots tracing back to 1988, Photoshop, developed by Thomas and John Knoll, has become an irreplaceable tool, not just for Macintosh, but for Windows and macOS users as well.
Photoshop Top Features
Layer-based editing system supporting various overlays, multiple layers, masks, alpha compositing and several color models.
Diverse selection of both basic and advanced tools such as Layers, Adjustment Layers, Clone Stamp, Healing Brush, Dodge and Burn tools.
Exclusive PSD and PSB file formats to support widespread features.
Additional functionalities like image creation, 3D graphics, video editing, and text rendering.
Feature
Description
Advanced plug-ins
Enhances software by offering new or improved features
Latest version: Photoshop 2022(23.3.1)
Includes innovations like the object selection tool, an updated properties panel, shortcuts for paint and brush, enhanced transform warp, background image removal option
Photoshop Limitations
Lack of a free version.
Can be complex for beginners to learn due to a wide range of features.
File sizes can become large affecting system performance.
Photoshop Use Cases
Use case 1: Graphic Designers
Photoshop is an indispensable asset for graphic designers. Courtesy of its array of tools and large color palette, designers can create and manipulate stunning images and graphics.
Use case 2: Web Developers
Web developers use Photoshop to churn out attractive yet functional website designs that captivate audiences and streamline their online experience.
Use case 3: Photographers & Illustrators
For photographers and illustrators, Photoshop is the go-to software for editing and enhancing their artwork. Its layer-based system and precise editing tools aid in producing perfect images.
CorelDRAW
The CorelDRAW is a multi-faceted professional design suite with game-changing capabilities for vector illustration, layout design, photo editing, and typography.
CorelDRAW Top Features
Democratizing design with its revolutionary Focus Mode that enables object editing in isolation
The ability to apply color to fills and outlines easily, reigniting the creative energy in your designs
Non-destructive editing of bitmaps and vectors, for preserving the raw essence of your creative work
AI-assisted PowerTRACE, raising the bar for bitmap-to-vector trace results
A flexible design space, multi-page view, and multi-asset export, enhancing your design workflow
Ensuring color consistency across different media for the utmost perfection in print and web design output
Exclusive Features
Usability
New advanced Print Merge workflow
User reviews indicate high ease of use
Cloud-based features, apps, and content exclusive to subscribers
Flexible design capabilities suiting various design needs
CorelDRAW.app for handy mobile editing
Robust feature set tackling complex design scenarios
CorelDRAW Downsides
Primarily compatible only with Windows and Mac
The subscription model may not be a preferred choice for some users
CorelDRAW Pricing
CorelDRAW offers both subscription and one-time purchase options, striving to meet different users’ needs and align with industry standards.
CorelDRAW Use Cases
Use case 1
CorelDRAW is elemental for graphic professionals in large corporations, driving brand identity creation, and sales tools design.
Use case 2
It empowers creatives in small businesses, enabling large-format printing, apparel and textile design, and digital advertising.
Use case 3
With its smart capabilities, CorelDRAW enhances web design, making it a popular choice across different sectors, including e-commerce, retail, and engineering.
Lightroom
Meet Lightroom, a versatile image organization and processing software by Adobe. As a vital part of the Creative Cloud subscription family, Lightroom provides quick, efficient photo editing capabilities for photographers, graphic designers, to digital marketers and social media managers alike.
Lightroom Top Features
Quick photo editing features enhancing contrast, balancing color, and adjusting brightness.
Built-in and customizable presets for on-the-go photography editing.
Sophisticated editing functions including white balance, presence, tone, tone curve, detail manipulation, lens corrections, and much more.
Non-destructive software maintaining original images separate from in-program edits.
Function
Description
Organization
Enables users to save, import, and export images, edit keywords, flag, rate, tag, and color code images immediately post-capture.
Compatibility
Supports Windows, macOS, iOS, Android, and tvOS (Apple TV). Adobe Lightroom is for mobile devices, and Apple TVs, while Lightroom Classic is designed for desktop use.
Lightroom Disadvantages
Subscription-based access may not appeal to all, as Adobe requires a monthly fee to access Adobe Creative Cloud.
Lightroom Pricing
Lightroom is available either individually for $9.99/month or as part of a bundle with Photoshop and online storage that ranges from $9.99 to $54.99/month.
Lightroom Use Cases
Use case 1: Photographers
For photographers, Lightroom offers a comprehensive, all-in-one workspace to manage, edit, and share visuals. The built-in presets and on-the-go editing capabilities expedite their workflow.
Use case 2: Digital marketers
Digital marketers can leverage Lightroom’s quick editing features and organization tools to enhance visuals for campaigns and brand promotion.
Use case 3: Social Media Managers
Social Media Managers can optimize visuals for different platforms, maintaining brand consistency and quickly responding to changing trends with Lightroom’s wide range of editing functions.
Illustrator
Unleash your artistic fervor with Adobe Illustrator– a robust vector graphics and animation software. Ideal for creating mobile graphics, product packagings, unique letterforms, and bespoke fonts, Illustrator wields the brush of surreality to fabricate your creative vision.
Illustrator Top Features
Complex editing capabilities such as mirror imaging and spacing adjustments.
Artboards for exporting banners in JPG, PNG formats.
Free-form gradients, versatile shapes, and typography tools for immersive designs.
Features point precision, vectorize for raster image conversion, and radial, grid, mirror repeat for sophisticated patterns.
A comprehensive type toolkit with a whopping 18,000+ fonts.
Seamless movement across Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop, Fresco with Adobe Creative Cloud integration.
Cloud synchronization for access from desktop or iPad.
Tool
Utility
Blend Tool
Enable magical blending of shapes
Polygons
Transform geometric figures into thrilling visuals
Regularly updated templates
Ready-to-use templates for social media, presentations, resumes
Illustrator Downsides
High learning curve, presents complexities for beginners.
Resource-intensive software.
No free version available, potentially a financial deterrent.
Illustrator Pricing
For individual users, Adobe Illustrator comes at a price of $19.99/month while businesses must shell out $29.99/month. Although there’s no free version, a 7-day trial period beckons potential users for a tantalizing taste of this software’s prowess.
Illustrator Use Cases
Use case 1: Professional Illustrators
The seamless integration and comprehensive toolkit make Illustrator a go-to choice for professional illustrators.
Use case 2: Web Design
With its robust vector graphics, Illustrator helps web designers curate distinctive graphics suitable for every pixel.
Use case 3: Graphic Design
Designing product packaging, business cards, or newsletters, Illustrator is seen as the industry standard.
Procreate
Crafting grandeur from the virtual, behold Procreate, a potent tool equipped for realizing your digital artistic visions. A cloud-based solution embroidering iOS platforms, Procreate assembles a suite tailored for sketching and illustrating that has earned acclaim, resonating with a whopping 4.8 rating culled from 101 reviews. Note, its design ingenuity is Apple-restricted, pairing perfectly with Apple’s Pencil for efficient imagery.
Procreate Top Features
Animation Assist Tool: Master time, bending it to your creative will with Procreate’s Animation Assist for time-lapse recording.
Customizable Brushes and Effects: Add personality to your strokes with a diverse range of brushes and striking effects.
Text Style Modification and Typography: Embed a narrative in your creation, stylizing fonts and typographies to suit your visual story.
Shape Drawing and Color Correction: Manifest accurate geometry seamlessly with Procreate’s Quick Shape, and tweak colors to perfection.
Feature
Value
Motion Filtering
Stabilization aids for smooth, refined strokes
VoiceOver, Dynamic Type, AssistiveTouch
Variety in access modes enhances inclusivity
Photoshop Brushes Support
Enables importing and using Photoshop brushes
Procreate Limitations
Limited layering based on canvas size and quality restricts depth of design.
Procreate’s exclusive domain is iPhone and iPad platforms, which may exclude non-iOS users.
Optimal functionality requires specific device parameters like high RAM, fast processors, large screen size, and Apple Pencil compatibility.
Procreate Pricing
Embrace the entire Procreate constellation at a fair bargain – a one-time license fee of $9.99. Sadly, no free trial version exists presently, although the quality vouched by the Procreate community might tempt you to leap in.
Procreate Use Cases
Use Case 1: Design and Aesthetics
Fashioning an immersive blend of arts and tech, Procreate serves designers – amateurs and professionals alike – by weaving a lush artistic palette with an array of brushes and effects. Sprinkle typographic magic or adjust color tones to your narrative’s heartbeat and see your visual symphony unfurl.
Use Case 2: Note-taking
Channel the efficiency of note-taking in Procreate with easy sketching avenues and accessible features that accommodate even the most complex ideas.
Use Case 3: Animation
Storytellers, educators, or anyone infatuated with motion will relish the Animation Assist, which empowers you to breathe life into static sketches. It is a potent platform to explore the captivating world of animation at your fingertips.
Canva
Founded in 2013, Canva is an online design powerhouse hailing from Sydney, Australia. It’s launched products such as Canva, Canva Pro, and Canva for Enterprise, garnering over 100 million users across the globe. With an overall rating of 4.7, Canva is a preferred choice for millions of individuals and companies aiming to design impressive visuals.
Canva Top Features
Drag-and-drop design: Enables users of all skill levels to create stunning visual content.
Photo editing: Effortlessly amend images to match your brand or message.
Magic Write: An AI-powered copywriting assistant launched in 2023 enhances your content with optimal communication.
Custom chart creation: Enables the visualisation of internal data in an efficient and effective way.
Feature
Description
Pre-built templates
Includes an extensive selection for logos, posters, social media posts, and more.
Custom fonts, frames, shapes, grids, icons
Allows users to customize designs to their specific needs and style.
Mobile apps availability
Offers two mobile apps for effortless designing on-the-go.
Canva Limitations
In May 2019, they suffered a data breach impacting approximately 139 million users.
Canva Pricing
The Canva Free, Canva for Education, and Canva for Not-for-Profit plans are available for free. Canva Pro charges $12.99 USD/month for the first user, and $6.99/month for each additional user. Enterprises can opt for Canva Enterprise at $30/month.
Canva Use Cases
Use case 1 – Content Creators
Canva empowers content creators to build visually appealing social media posts, newsletters, and more with its wide variety of pre-built templates, fonts, and shapes.
Use case 2 – Educators
Teachers and students leverage Canva’s user-friendly interface to create engaging educational content, with a dedicated Canva for Education available at no cost.
Use case 3 – Non-profits
Non-profit organizations can effectively convey their mission and gather support using Canva’s visual content tools, courtesy of the free Canva for Not-for-Profit.
Affinity
Behold Affinity, a standout vector graphics software tool by Serif Europe. Released in 2014, it anchors the Affinity trinity alongside Affinity Photo and Publisher. Originally marketed as an Adobe Illustrator alternative, it’s compatible with numerous file formats and caters to the needs of designing professionals.
Affinity Top Features
Scoped collection of vector pen and shape-drawing tools, and custom brushes support.
Offers dynamic symbols, stroke stabilization, and text style management.
Employs non-destructive editing with real-time effects and transformations.
Supports diverse color models and offers one sky PANTONE color swatches and end-to-end CMYK workflow with ICC color management.
Exudes flexibility by allowing seamless switching between vector and pixel workspaces.
Undo Action
Preserved up to 8000 times, keeps design history intact even post-closure.
Workspace Flexibility
Designer, Pixel, and Export Personas.
Fills & Strokes
Permits multiple fills or strokes on single objects.
Affinity Downsides
Caters exclusively to macOS at the onset, raised compatibility later.
No subscription model, necessitates full upfront payment.
iPad version needs a separate purchase, despite having analogous toolset.
Affinity Pricing
Affinity bears a one-time cost of USD$69.99 on Windows or macOS, and USD$18.49 for the iPad version. For a suite spanning all platforms, the price is USD$164.99. On a silver lining, there’s no recurring subscription.
Affinity Use Cases
Use case 1: Professional Illustrators
With a gamut of specialist tools and features, Affinity serves as an ideal companion for professional illustrators.
Use case 2: Web Designers
Its comprehensive toolset and file compatibility make it a web designer’s ally.
Use case 3: Game Developers
Affinity’s vector and pixel-uri capabilities are invaluable to game developers for creating intricate designs.
Elements
A product endowed with the prowess of the University of Colorado Boulder, Elements is a potent combo of a graphic design course and a 3D structural analysis design software. It provides foundational graphic design skills and facilitates the design and analysis of complex structures.
Elements Top Features
A comprehensive module covering graphic design’s history, design principles, project expectations, and essential software.
Focus on color theory, online design, textual elements, graphic design, and print design.
Powerful 3D finite element analysis for steel, concrete, cold-formed steel, masonry projects, and more.
Offerings dedicated to trusses, beams, frames, different types of walls, and footings design.
Requirement
Value
Processor
1.3 GHz or faster
Operating System
Microsoft Windows 10 or higher
RAM
2 GB minimum, 4 GB recommended
Elements Downsides
The “Basic Elements of Design” course is limited to the English language, with subtitles available for other languages. This could limit comprehension for non-English speakers.
No company-specific software design details are available, potentially causing confusion or misinterpretation.
Elements Pricing
Licensing, subscription options include 12-month subscription, one-time purchase, & support. The Perpetual License bundle with SELECT features 24/7/365 technical support, with annual renewal quotes sent via email.
Elements Use Cases
Use case 1
For graphic designers seeking to understand the foundational skills and principles, Elements provides a detailed guide. Its comprehensive training breaks down complex concepts, making it an excellent choice for beginners.
Use case 2
For structural engineers dealing with steel, concrete, timber, or masonry projects, Elements serves as a reliable tool for design and analysis to optimize materials and resource efficiency.
Use case 3
For firms like WSP and VYOM that are tackling adventurous projects necessitating robust design and analysis capabilities, Elements‘ 3D finite element analysis proves invaluable.
Clip Studio Paint
Allow us to introduce Clip Studio Paint, a leading graphic design software, revered for its exceptional capabilities in the realm of digital art creation. Developed by Celsys, this software has been positioned as a preferred choice for professional designers, concept artists, illustrators, and animators since 2001.
Clip Studio Paint Top Features
Vector drawing coupled with pen pressure reflection for an elevated drawing experience.
Extensive brush customization, supporting diverse styles from pen, pencil, watercolor to oil paint.
Capability to import Photoshop brushes, providing even greater variety in expressions.
Over 55,000 brush materials accessible on Clip Studio Paint’s material site.
3D support for precision drawings.
Elevated layer management with searchable layers and layer folders.
Shortcut keys that can be customized based on individual workflow preferences.
Versatile file type support including PNG, JPEG, PSD, SVG.
File backing on Cloud with history tracking.
Distinct from Other Design Software
Designed for Comic Creation
Imports files from other design software like Adobe Photoshop, bringing added functionality and familiarity.
Equips users with tools for sketching, inking, coloring, creating panel layouts, word balloons and captions, manifesting as a comprehensive tool for comic creation.
Maintain with Ease
Efficient Backup
Clip Studio Paint Limitations
Version 2 update requires either a license, an annual purchase of an “upgrade pass”, or a shift to subscription licensing— potentially adding to costs.
While it offers file imports from other software, native interaction with said software may be limited.
The sheer volume of features may come across as overwhelming for new users.
Clip Studio Paint Pricing
On the pricing frontier, Clip Studio Paint establishes itself as a cost-effective player with the PRO version priced at $3.51/month, and the EX version at $71.99/year. Payment options include perpetual license or an ongoing subscription.
Clip Studio Paint Use Cases
Use Case 1: Professional Illustrators
With its range of brushes, ink tools, textures and coloring features, Clip Studio Paint serves as a comprehensive suite for illustrators, enabling them to bring their creative visions to life with the striking precision this tool provides.
Use Case 2: Concept Artists
By merging superior design and illustration capabilities, Clip Studio Paint comes as a boon to concept artists, helping them devise and convey their unique concepts effortlessly and conveniently.
Use Case 3: Comic Creators
With tools for sketching, inking, coloring, and creating panel layouts, word balloons, and captions, Clip Studio Paint is equipped to aid comic creators in manifesting their narratives in a compelling visual format.
Inkscape
Unfurling its grandeur in the realm of vector graphics editing is Inkscape, a powerful open-source software, compatibly harmonizing with GNU/Linux, Windows and MacOS. An artistic canvas where the technical intermingles with the aesthetic, Inkscape expertly crafts diagrams, logos, typography, and more with infinite resolution precision.
Key Features of Inkspace
An extensive file format compatibility ensconcing SVG, AI, EPS, PDF, PS, PNG, and more.
A robust suite of innovative tools arrayed for crafting, shaping, and coloring artworks, diagrams, illustrations, and charts.
Advanced layer support underpinning precise object grouping and asset manipulation with unwavering precision.
Provision of path-offsets (inset, outset, linked or dynamic) granting supreme flexibility in work.
The distinct introduction of a cloning feature, generating child objects derived from an original parent object.
Tools
Function
Pen, Pencil, Calligraphy tool, Text tool
Provides high levels of freedom for versatile editing.
Z-order
Manages sequence of drawn objects for ordered design.
SVG 1.1 compliance
Supports the rendering of primitive vector shapes
Limitations of Inkscape
The software might intimidate beginners due to its wide array of features.
Processing of complex projects can be slow, hindering productivity.
Potential lack of more advanced features present in commercial alternatives.
Inkscape Pricing
Proclaiming the open-source spirit of liberty, Inkscape bestows its feature-rich software freely upon its users, unrestricted by economic constraints.
Inkscape Use Cases
Use case 1 Small and Medium Businesses
Inkscape, with its web-based device proficiency, provides a suitable platform for small and medium businesses, delivering a gamut of graphics editing tools under a zero-cost model.
Use case 2 Typographers and Logotype Designers
Its top-grade text tool permits typographers to dexterously tweak font, spacing, kerning, and rotation, thus rendering expressive typefaces and elegant logotypes.
Use Case 3 Flowchart Creators and Diagram Designers
Empowered with dynamic path-offsets and a clone creation feature, Inkscape allows creators to craft intricate diagrams and flowcharts with precision and flexibility.
Grant Sullivan
Content writer @ Aircada and self proclaimed board game strategist by day, AI developer by night.
