To provide the best experiences, we and our partners use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us and our partners to process personal data such as browsing behavior or unique IDs on this site and show (non-) personalized ads. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Click below to consent to the above or make granular choices. Your choices will be applied to this site only. You can change your settings at any time, including withdrawing your consent, by using the toggles on the Cookie Policy, or by clicking on the manage consent button at the bottom of the screen.
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes.
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
I’m a engineer/techwriter, machine tool industry (mostly)
Main image editor=Corel Photo Paint
alternate editor: The Gimp.
I have never (in 20 years of this, and occasional DTP)used Photoshop.
I have been using the beta of Adobe Lightroom and I’m hooked. I plan on getting the final version when available.
Photographer
ACDSee is alternate viewer and editor, for the same reason Sports Illustrated uses it at the SUper Bowl, a very fast way to view and select/discard images. ALso OK for basic editing and batch processing.
iMaginator by Stone design, and even iPhoto by Apple. Apple has built in a lot of image editing tools into Tiger (CoreImage). Stone has a policy of free upgrades for life. Buy it now, own all future versions forever.
Pixmaker Pro,Photo Vista, 3d Photo Builder,
All these support & supplant the Blending actions in Photoshop
Picture Window Pro
Besides Photoshop, I use Gimp (which is FREE and a decent Photoshop clone, minus Photoshop’s CMYK and Pantone support), Microsoft Paint, Adobe ImageReady, and a number of programs that allow for easy image format changes, such as Hijaak Pro, IrfanView, etc. Strangely enough, there are image formats that Photoshop does NOT support (such as making icons for Windows systems). Graphic Converter on the Mac is also useful.
Adobe Lightroom for initial editing
iView Multimedia Pro for previewing and cataloging due to it’s incredible speed and ease of use
GraphicConverter X –
https://macupdate.com/info.php/id/263
GraphicConverter X –
https://macupdate.com/info.php/id/263
I still use Live Picture, although it runs only under OS 9. In many of its functions it is superior to Photoshop, and is able to do some things that Photoshop is incapable of. It is a program I use regularly in image compositing. I’d be lost without it, and only wish that someone would see the value of updating the code so that it will run under modern operating systems.
Fireworks
Corel Painter!
I know I use it where I need the incredible tools to create things that would be difficult or impossible in Photoshop.
I use Xara Xtreme in combination with Photoshop to create images for my newsletters and web graphics.
I use Corel Painter a lot when editing images, yet it never gets included in these surveys. It has many tools, filters and brushes that are not available in Photoshop, and Version 9 is extremely compatible. The cloning function is particurly useful when combining images, and that one can paint on a layer with true subtlty is superior. Perhaps Paint Shop Pro does some of this, but I wouldn’t know.
It would be interesting to do a survey on the use of this application.
Name your alternate image editor;
Paint Shop Pro and Fireworks
I primarily use Photoshop but occassionally use Corel Painter
GIMP image editor, Inkscape, and Scribus.
I do web, print, and graphics (T-shirts, etc.) using these three programs, on Linux.
I occasionally use ACDsee on XP for simple editing. I got it for cataloging media. I have started using GIMP on OSX rather than spend money on Photoshop. Neither is a replacement for Photoshop but I can get much of what I need done with them.
Corel Photo-paint
I use Corel Photo Paint X3
I also use Google’s Picasa for doing fast, simple, cleanup work on digital photos for a website. I can straighten, color and light balance, crop, and resize images into uniformity very quickly and for free.
(for mac) GraphicConverter
How about Adobe Lightroom
Corel PhotoPaint
I use Print Shop version 22 now for most of my photo corrections and greeting cards. Photoshop is also an option for me for detail of choosing a part of a photo.
I also use Photoshop Elements 4 for the “creativity” features and some of the other features that CS2 doesn’t have.
I use Photoshop mostly for print and Fireworks for web work. That is it. They more than serve my needs…
I pose the question only because of my own notion of what constitutes “editing”. In my opinion, if it doesn’t “move pixels”, it ain’t an editor! So applications such as Adobe Lightroom or Capture NX aren’t technically (in my mind) editors. You can’t swap heads or remove blemishes or eliminate trees and buildings with those applications. Raw processing software prepares images to be brought into editing software. Using that “logic”, Corel Photo Paint is an editor, while Capture NX is not.
I can’t imaging giving up Photoshop.
I’m trialing Adobe Lightbox (beta) but I use both Photoshop CS2 and Photoshop Elements for my normal workflow, depending on the needs of the moment.
Lee Eschen
For graphic web design Fireworks does it all for me. I almost never use PS, although I suppose I will have to actually buy it soon! ;-)
Bridge works smoothly and naturally with Photoshop CS2, I can put out quite a quantity with that combo
Debabelizer. Perhaps I can do similar things in Photoshop, but it has two stellar advantages – (1) easily handles batches with sophistication (like the 800 images just off my camera); and
(2) great technical sophistication (like taking all pixels in a certain specified RGB range and doing something to them)
I use Adobe Lightroom beta since its first public version and I find it very useful. Of course, it is not intended to replace Photoshop, since its purpose is completely different. I will never stop using Photoshop, because there is nothing else like it.
As a testament to Photoshop, I would agree with the article, although Photoshop has its’ short comings which are being cancelled out with each new version.
However, I use Fotostation, Canon’s ZoomBrowser and IfranView on occasion.
I often use GraphicConverter for quicker editing than PS – despite being seen as a format converter it actually has a very good sharpen filter and image enhancement tools for basic retouching, cropping etc. Excellent for saving files to virtually any format.
I also used to use ColorIt! for excellent but simpler processing of images – this has now appeared in an OS X version but I have not been able to get it via download yet so it may be outdated if it lacks features, but I can’t confirm that – it does however claim to have layers, so certainly has some new features
I primarily use Macromedia Fireworks for Web dev jobs — and also just started using Google’s Picasa for quick image editing of most of my personal photos. It’s efficient and effective and free!
I use Photoshop about 50% of the time and I split the difference between Irfanview and Paint.NET – both have features or are easier to use than Photoshop for specific tasks.
Here is one important editing program that you overlooked in your article – CorelDraw Graphics Suite 12 which includes Corel PhotoPaint. It is a great suite that is comparable to Photoshop.
Macromedia Fireworks
Because our office uses CorelDraw 12 extensively, I’ll on occasion use Corel Photo-Paint 12. Photoshop is still my favourite application, but CorelDraw doesn’t allow me to quickly edit an image with PhotoShop when editing an image I have placed in my CorelDraw file. As soon as I figure this out I’ll probably never use Photo-Paint again.
Raw Shooter Pro (now owned by Adobe)
We run an entertainment website and usually convert or create our clients’ web banners. We also edit photos, create postcards, flyers, banners, t-shirt designs etc. using Fireworks. It has many of the same features as Photoshop, can use Photoshop plugins as well as those from Alien Skin et al and is much more userfriendly and in my opinion, intuitive than Photoshop. I took a class in Photoshop back in the day when we were still raw-coding HTML and learning Dreamweaver 2. We used Fireworks in my Dreamweaver class and compared to Photoshop, it was much easier and faster plus it integrates directly with Dreamweaver and Freehand and can export in a variety of formats – including Photoshop native files. I don’t know anything about the other programmes listed but you got my vote for Fireworks – at least as long as Adobe/Macromedia keeps this treasure around!
I am a photog working to make it my profession and use Photoshop for serious image adjustments. However, when I download file from my EOS 30D I often use the Utility supplied w/ the camera for initial adjustments. This is also satisfactory for images I just want to share w/ friends or send them to print. I plan to try Digital
Photo Pro 2.1 w/ RAW files in the near future.
Painter
Lightroom
Live Picture
Lightroom, Digital Photo Professional
I use Corel PhotoPaint and Adobe/Macromedia Fireworks as well
Microsoft PhotoDraw 2000 – why they discontinued this program is beyond me – I use it as my primary graphics tool for everything.
Graphic Converter!
In addition to Photoshop, I also use Corel PhotoPaint X3 and find it to be a very powerful program. Depending upon what I want to do with the photo, sometimes I use Adobe Photoshop Elements or PaintShop Pro.
https://www.dl-c.com/Temp/
This program costs $100, is not as bloated as Photoshop and is great for photos… a lot of pros are starting to use it…
Corel Painter and Adobe LightRoom
Why Photoshop has become synanamous with Photo Retouching in India is because the people here have a tendency to blindly follow the safe path;as an Indian I can say this because I am a living proof of it.80% users here use Photshop as Image editing tool,instead of phot-retouching tool;whereas Corel Draw is perhaps used by 99% of users.There are very few who would try out a new,more innovative or a software with steep learning curve;and they are a community in themselsves.Why is Photshop always confused with DTP software is a funny thing;even though 50% of prepress printers don’t know the diffrence between “Bitmap Editing” and “Vector Image”;all they know is that files should be in 24 bit BMP format and CMYK profile.The most widely used functions of Photoshop in India is creating photo montage and adding/replacing of background.Though now designers who have broken out of the mould and set-up their own indi-studio are using Photoshop’s immense creativity.
Most Canon Users shooting in Raw Format need to use the Canon program for conversion then Photoshop. CS2 users can use Adobe Bridge to convert.
Fireworks
Painter
Gimp
As an alternative add-in software for Photoshop I often use Picasa as a quick way to see what I have in my digital photos. I’ll sometimes use the “I’m feeling lucky” button to see if there is potential in a photo, although it’s way too coarse of an adjustment for most photos. I use Picasa more just to do quick and dirty fast adjustments then I will open the same photos in Photoshop for fine tuning. I use Photoshop a LOT for digital paintings and collages.