Paint.NET is another good alternative, however the .NET already suggested it is for Windows. Therefore, GIMP is the open source software that you may want to try it out (if you are not using Windows).

GIMP stands for GNU Image Manipulation Program. From its name, we know that it’s a software like Photoshop or Paint.NET. It can do task like photo retouching, image composition and image authoring.

GIMP is also:

• a simple paint program
• an expert quality photo retouching program
• an online batch processing system
• a mass production image renderer
• an image format converter

It supports multiple file formats from common ones like JPEG, GIF, PNG, TIFF to special use formats such as TGA, BMP, XWD, XPM, PIX, CEL, MNG, PPM, PCX, etc. Like Photoshop, GIMP has a list of plugins to enhance its functionality too.

It looks similar to Photoshop but if you will need some time to get use to it (if you have been a heavy Photoshop user).

However, you can always go through the tutorial provided by the official GIMP website to learn how to use GIMP the easy way.

GIMP supports multiple platforms including:

• Linux (i386, PPC)
• Microsoft Windows (XP, Vista)
• Mac OS X
• Sun OpenSolaris
• FreeBSD

Tip: Ubuntu Linux distro has GIMP pre-installed.

Download GIMP.

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SitePoint is currently giving away a FREE Photoshop e-book in PDF form namely, The Photoshop Anthology: 101 Web Design Tips, Tricks & Techniques. It consists of 278 pages in full color with 9 big chapters available. It is a good tutorial for beginners. Covering topics from the basic usage of the Photoshop components to basic skills on creating web interface like buttons and backgrounds. Also on photo color adjutsment and manipulation, concept of designing a website, as well as advance technique like creating watermark and many more…

Getting your own FREE copy of this e-book is completely FREE of charge without any hidden fee. However, such offer is only available for a limited time. This giveaway will expire in 15 days time by the time I post this up.

Sample content of the free e-book

To get your own copy, go to SitePoint and provide them a valid email address in order for them to send you the download link.

Check your email in about 5 minutes time (usually takes longer time for free email services like Yahoo or Hotmail). In the email, you will be given 2 links to the FREE PDF e-book in zip format. The 2 links are for 2 version of the e-book of different resolution (with same content, of course).

A high resolution of 64MB.

A lower resolution of 23MB.

It’s your choice to choose which resolution you want. I’ve downloaded a high resolution copy for myself. Make sure you grab yours too, before the offer expires.

[ via Freedom Rider ]

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Sometimes this is very frustrating as I don’t have a powerful computer for this. It normally takes quite a lot of resources and slow down the CPU performance. I’ve found an alternative way to solve this problem. Now, I can easily choose the color I need and obtain the 6 digit codes easily.

John Dyer has created a Photoshop-like Javascript color picker application. This piece of Javascript code is proven to work on IE5.5, IE6, IE7, FF2, Opera 9, Safari 2. However, this is not the only color picker available from the Internet. But you can still give it a try since it’s really a light-weight web-based application.

You can easily access the Color Picker when you have access to the Internet. Or you can even download the codes and launch the script locally from your computer.

Like I said before, I depend a lot on Photoshop, I have no problem using this simple Photoshop-like Javascript Color Picker. It feels like home

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Paint.NET is free image and photo editing software for computers that run Windows. It features an intuitive and innovative user interface with support for layers, unlimited undo, special effects, and a wide variety of useful and powerful tools.

If you want a free image editing software which is small and powerful, this is for you. It’s small in size and can do more than the default Microsoft Paint and almost equivalent to professional software such as Adobe Photoshop.

Some claimed it as “free version of Photoshop”.

Why will you want to use Paint.NET?

• It’s free!
• It requires just a small portion of your hard disk space.
• It can let you do things like a professional.
• It’s not as laggy as Photoshop (for computer with lower spec)

You need Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 in order for this to work.
Download: Paint.NET

Although I depend a lot on Photoshop, I find this very handy when I want to do some notes on the screenshots that I have taken. I can easily draw arrows, lines, boxes, add text whenever I want. Although you can do such things in most editing software like Photoshop, Microsoft Paint or even IrfanView, this is still the most convenient one for me.

Now, I can easily finish doing a pictorial guide within minutes. The following image is what I did for a printer configuration tutorial using Paint.NET.

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DesignFruit

Featured Brush – Japanese Foliage™

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Here will be a collection of tutorial links for Adobe Photoshop.
I will keep the list update whenever I find any good Photoshop tutorial site.

http://www.photoshoplab.com/