Software Review
Pixelmator
If you've done any sorts of photo editing, you might have used Photoshop at one point. Photoshop is what high end graphic designers used in their day to day work. It's also one of the standards graphic shops use. But common, Photoshop isn't cheap and you might not even use all the features it offers. There are several cheaper alternative to Photoshop. Gimp for example is an open source photo editor that has Photoshop functions. It's cheap and it's very useful if you're a graphic designer on a budget. But I think we've found another alternative that's not going to break the bank and is as close to Photoshop functionality you can get. Tonight we'll take a look at Pixelmator for Mac OS X. Sorry for our PC readers, yes we've been delving into the Mac OS for several months now and here's our first software review. We also would like to thank the Pixelmator team for making this review possible.
Click the image to see it full view...
Pixelmator somewhat has the same feel of Photoshop's interface. If you've used Photoshop before, you'll never feel lost when using Pixelmator. Let's take a look first at the tools. Pixelmator gives you many tools to manipulate your image. You got your selection tools, an assortment of painting as well as retouching tools. Pixelmator is also a layer-based image editor, making photo editing much more simpler. You also get a variety of blending options for your layers to add your desired effect in your composition. The color correction tools are also very powerful. You can fix hues, saturation and luminance. Additionally you can also adjust exposures, color levels, brightness and even contrast.
The GELID thermal compound worked very well based in our results. The CPU was three to four degrees cooler with the GELID compound compared to the generic no name thermal paste. The GC Extreme cooled our E6750 the best with a CPU temperature at 3.6GHz at only 43 degrees. When installing your new CPU, don't overlook the use of a very good thermal paste. This compound will help ensure your CPU is effectively touching your CPU cooler, thus making it more stable.
There are also plenty of built in filters and effects included in Pixelmator. It has effects such as distortions, blur effects, stylize , etc. One thing we really like about Pixelmator is its real time preview of any effects, filters or changes you make. So you don't need to wait for the computer to render the effects to see the end result. Pixelmator is based on Core Image technology and is the first GPU-based image editor. It uses your graphics card for image processing which frees up your CPU to perform other job. We found Pixelmator very responsive and fast. If you go to Pixelmator's website, you'll also find a bunch of great tutorials as well as a lively forum for those who want to find out more about this powerful little graphics editor.
Click the image to see it full view...
If you're looking for a Photoshop alternative, give Pixelmator a try. Priced at $59, you can't really go wrong. The look and fell is very similar to Photoshop as well so it's not really hard to get used to it. The software itself is very fast and responsive and it even does image preview in realtime so you see the effects instantly. Take a look at a graphics I made above, this is after about fifteen minutes of using the software with the help of the "Sparkling Hot Girl" tutorial found on Pixelmator's website. We give Pixelmator a score of 10 out 10 and our Editor's Choice.
Pros:
GPU powered graphics editor
Assorted tools
Great built in effects and filters
Live preview
Fantastic alternative to Photoshop
ONLY $59
Cons:
Only available to MAC users
Manufacturer Link:
