I need a new photo program

[Paprika]

I'm going to go against the tide here and suggest that your best bet is to learn to use Photos. It's not aimed at graphics pros, but it can do what you need to do with a lot less fuss and complication than Photoshop, Lightroom or Gimp. Sometimes simplicity is a virtue. :-)

If you Google 'apple photos app tutorial', you'll find a bunch of article on getting the most out of this program. For example, here's a good overview from iMore, with links to articles on how to do specific tasks.

[DavidsonOverlander]

Originally Posted by Paprika

I'm going to go against the tide here and suggest that your best bet is to learn to use Photos. It's not aimed at graphics pros, but it can do what you need to do with a lot less fuss and complication than Photoshop, Lightroom or Gimp. Sometimes simplicity is a virtue. :-)

If you Google 'apple photos app tutorial', you'll find a bunch of article on getting the most out of this program. For example, here's a good overview from iMore, with links to articles on how to do specific tasks.

Or you could go even simpler and use Google Photos.

I use three programs depending on the purpose. I have Adobe Photoshop Elements 8 for major editing. Yes it's 10 years old (and I can hear some of you snickering), but it still works great on my 6-year-old MacBook Pro. I use Apple Photos if I need a less powerful tool, and I use Google Photos if I just need to adjust lighting a bit and crop/rotate. Google Photos works fine for most online use, and my phone automatically uploads to it so it's especially convenient for phone photos.

Plus one more - not so much for photo editing, but if I want to add something like text or arrows to a photo I use Google Draw.

[tizeye]

Originally Posted by DavidsonOverlander

I have Adobe Photoshop Elements 8 for major editing. Yes it's 10 years old (and I can hear some of you snickering), but it still works great on my 6-year-old MacBook Pro.

Nothing wrong with that. A little history...Photoshop was created in 1987 and a year later Paint Shop became one of the top 3 "must have" shareware programs. I was kind of where GIMP is today, then made the successful jump to a commercial program, Paint Shop Pro, when acquired by JASC and now Corel. I used is for years, starting with shareware through Corel, updating every 2nd or 3rd version. The strength of that $99 program, doing 90% of what Photoshop would do, is what forced Adobe's hand to create Photoshop Elements and make it as powerful as it is, infringing on their Photoshop program. At least Elements is PC/Mac where Corel hasn't created a Mac version of PSP. That is why I was glad to find Affinity Photo which has similar power

[InterBlog]

Can I ask the same question, but with greater specificity?

Rather than "what program do you use", I'd like to know what program comes closest to the discontinued Picasa 3.

I've tried several softwares both free and fee, and they are either poorly designed with shockingly high learning curves, or they have 1,000 times more features than I care to learn, or both.

Straighten, crop, sharpen, brighten, color temperature. Those 5 parameters are all that the average person needs to work with. Just those 5. They are what Picasa did best. But I can't find anything that ergonomically offers that kind of functionality without all kinds of confusing junk loaded in.

Thanks.

[Omega Man]

Any suggestions with a photo organizer? I had a mac book pro and the computer seems to do what it wants.

I'm ok with Microsoft, with files and sub-files but Mac don't want to play that game.

[Hittenstiehl]

When I asked that here some time ago I was recommended to try Photo Editor.

I since have it on my Android phone (came installed) and it works nicely. I mainly just use crop, light balance or B/W and it makes my pictures more presentable.

I particularly like your photos when you place several images together and I don't yet know how to do that although I haven't tried hard enough.

[InterBlog]

Photo Editor (BeFunky) is among the better options ergonomically speaking, but it has two downsides:

(1) It assumes you have internet, and unlimited data would be useful, too. Neither are true when I'm on the road.

(2) It doesn't seem to offer true watermarking the way Picasa did. Text can be added easily, but it's a manual process that must be repeated one pic at a time. Picasa was automated in that regard. Watermarking was probably Picasa's strongest suit. Photo Editor might be able to approximate that via a layers process - I haven't tried to exploit that. Even if it does, it's a far cry from Picasa's simple checkbox.

I'd prefer a desktop package that can function offline.

I tried Irfanview, which is one of the more popular freewares - I really, really tried to learn it and like it. But it's the Rube Goldberg of image manipulation software! Ten thousand different functions with no importance hierarchy built in. Brightness and contrast were buried deep in the same stack of obscure functions that would require an undergraduate physics degree to comprehend.

I make my image collages in Powerpoint, and then group elements and re-save as JPGs for posting to Imgur. K.I.S.S. principle.

[tizeye]

Originally Posted by Omega Man

Any suggestions with a photo organizer? I had a mac book pro and the computer seems to do what it wants.

I'm ok with Microsoft, with files and sub-files but Mac don't want to play that game.

For simply relying on photo organization (but with the capability of simple to moderate editing) look at Corel's Aftershot Pro 3 (30 day free trial, $59 full). It is Mac compatible, where unfortunately the 'sister' program Paint Shop Pro is not. Think of them as the Lightroom/Photoshop combo competitors with Aftershot mimicking Lightroom. Now if Corel would just make PSP Mac compatible and not rely on the excuse that will work under Parallels which has other issues.

Staying with Mac, from what I understand On-1 Raw is about to introduce DAM photo organization by upgrade into it's current version...but that is a powerful program in it's own right.

[KelloggKid]

I second the recommendation for Affinity Photo. While they have yet to add DAM capability it has plenty of features and is easy to learn. Their tutorial videos and hardback book are very, very well done. We were so impressed with it that we also picked up their Designer product and I'm now beta testing their Publisher software. All great stuff. And no subscriptions required.

[Tuco]

Photoshop. I know its not what you want to hear, but just learn the features you desire first. The program is just to powerful to pass up once you understand what it can do. There are lots of good tutorials for this application.

[SilverWind]

Adobe Lightroom 6.2 (non-subscription MAC version) has been my staple for years. I also use Affinity Photo and Luminar 2018. Lightroom on 2017 Mac Pro on external drives and Affinity on a lesser equipped MacAir.

[Mollysdad]

On a Mac, I use "Preview" to resize photos.
Click on your image (I store mine in downloads)
Wait a couple seconds and Preview should open.
The toolbar should have an icon "Markup" which looks like a Acura Logo. That will open more tools, one of which is the "re-size".
It's super easy. It will tell you what the current image is in pixels or inches, and you just select a new number. Done.


I miss Photoshop from when I had a windows machine. I did simple stuff like changing my photos or removing telephone poles, etc. But I'm not paying hundreds for software.

[nryn]

There are no shortage of inexpensive image processing tools on the Mac App Store. I’ve been using Photoshop professionally since version 2.0 (read: a long time ago). The only reason I would suggest it for anyone now is if they did offset / professional printing or relied on it in a . For the money (and even notwithstanding money) it’s a pretty poor, bloated tool for most people’s needs.

A colleague of mine (also a designer) once said it best—there was a time in our careers when we would do anything to be able to afford Adobe software. Now, most of the professionals I know would pay anything to not have to use it.

Affinity Photo is more advanced but pretty great. I do 99% of my professional photography in Capture One other than prep for the art prints I make, which I do in Photoshop. I don’t do a lot of image manipulation (more global processing).

If you are on a Mac, look into Pixelmator and if your needs are more basic, Acorn. As previously mentioned, Preview (built into MacOS) and even Photos cover the basics quite well.