So this weekend I was playing with my new MacBook Air, getting it all set up with MAMP and whatnot, and one app I debated was Photoshop. I’ve never owned a copy of Photoshop – in college I “acquired” a copy, and since then whoever my employer was at the time has always purchased a license for me to use. I’ve never owned a personal copy. I’ve almost bought it at one time or another, but it’s just so staggeringly expensive it’s always given me pause.
So there I was this weekend, trying to decide, do I install the copy from work on my laptop? (quite legal, I asked the Adobe reps last time they were at work, and they said it was fine, as long as it was only running on one machine at a time, I could install it both places)
On the other hand Photoshop is a beast of an application, massive and bloated, with other unused applications (Bridge? Adobe Updater? WTF?) dangling off it like engorged ticks. Did I really want all that on my fresh new laptop?
Yes, I know, GIMP. The GNU Image Manipulation Program, open source and fully functional, without the bloat. But not quite the same. Obvious in places, ineffable in others, it just isn’t as good.
I was excited about GIMPshop, GIMP modified to look and feel more like Photoshop, but unfortunately from what I can tell, that project is dead, and hasn’t been updated in a while. It wouldn’t run under Snow Leopard – even after upgrading and downgrading the appropriate libraries that were supposed to coax it into running.
Seashore is nice, a simplified GIMP compiled in Cocoa to be more Mac-like… that might be good enough, but lacks some things and I believe is also based on an old version of GIMP.
Pixelmator I had from a bundle deal, it’s pretty good but lacks the layer blending options I use a lot…
I dunno… is Photoshop a necessity? What do you think?
My wife and I get a lot of millage out of Photoshop Elements. It’s not without its flaws, but it’s under $100 and still has the tools and interface we’re familiar with from its big brother. The latest few versions have been OSX compatible as well. I’m also a big fan of Paint.net, but it’s Windows only.