Image editors for the Mac

The premier graphics and image editor for the Mac is of course Adobe Photoshop. But Photoshop might not be suitable for some users. First of all there's the cost and second, Photoshop is too darn big and resource hungry.

What if there applications out there that's not as expensive and as bloated as Photoshop but will still be able to the job intended? There are graphics and image editing programs that are not as resource hogs and cost less than $100. Actually, some of them are even free.

I got these software from Macworld's articles Image editors for the rest of us and More image editors for the rest of us written by James Dempsey.

Dempsey talks about Acorn ($40, introductory price) and Pixel ($38 now. $89 when it hits version 2), and his favorite, Pixelmator ($59).

...I covered two programs at opposite ends of the spectrum. One newly released image editor, Acorn, doesn’t go for flash or overloaded features, but its simplicity means that it does its tasks very well. Pixel, on the other hand, tries to do everything, but in my opinion, it fails at an unacceptable number of tasks. For me, the sweet spot is Pixelmator...

If the $38 to $ 59 price tag still deters you from getting these Adobe Photoshop (or Elements) alternatives, then there's Imagewell and Pixen. Imagewell is an application you can use to resize photos, add drop shadows and add text quickly and painlessly. It is said to be really handy for bloggers. For icon designers or anybody who likes working with pixels, there's Pixen. Useful for making Web site favicons and les-res animated images.

I'm going to give Imagewell a try for those quick and dirty editing jobs. I'm not much into the creative beat but I'm also interested in trying out Pixen. I got them both on my Powerbook already. Imagewell is a small download compared to what it is says it can do: only 928 KB. Pixen is a 5.9 MB download.

Oh, I got both at the very low price of free.

I will be trying these two out and will post my unprofessional, mini-review if I am able to remember to.