Paint.net
getpaint.net
getpaint.net
- Sufficient even for mid-complexity art tasks
- Nice, simple interface
- Plenty of plugins
I don't mind the proprietary format -- since I'm usually just doing quick tasks in it, I'm either saving as jpg or png, or don't expect to need to open the pdn file at some later time or in other software.
However for anyone looking to start with something new, I'd really recommend using Krita or some other more recent program. Paint.net's available plugins are wildly disorganized, spread across at least one forum and hundreds of threads, often out of date or not working as intended, etc.
Great community and they deserve all the praise for maintaining free software for many years, but much like Gimp, it's just not the best free option available anymore.
Offers basic functionality, that allows the user to easily achieve most goals.
It's not intended as a Photoshop replacement (GIMP tries to) or a professional tool.
But most other users will find that what they're trying to achieve is straightforward compared to other options.
Gimp on the other hand… only for power users. I recently tried using it for some quick edits (apt install gimp popped into my head first) What a nightmare.
Linux apps of old were the bare engine with no seat belts and cup holders, and often no steering wheel. Windows apps back in the day were often way better about easing users in.
I also run https://github.com/viliusle/miniPaint using Cloudflare Pages so it's hosted in one of my sub-domains as minipaint.[mydomainhere] and it's great for quick jobs.
How does it compare to something like photopea.com ?
Compared to Photopea - there are no cloud services access and limited formats (no PSD, etc). But gratis and no ads.
It's a brilliant quick photo editor.
People say to use Pinta on Mac but it's not the same. The closest I've found is Pixelmator Pro, which is also awesome, but is not free and quite a bit heavier than Paint.net.
As I understand Paint.Net it is a WPF app. I wish the author would just use Avalonia XPF to port it to Linux and Mac. XPF is a drop-in replacement for WPF which can easily make WPF apps cross-platform for some money. I wouldn't mind paying my share.
My favourite in this category is Flying Meat’s Acorn. Really nice.
some software can't be replaced and don't have good enough alternatives, and prevent me from switch to linux
windows is getting worse, but not bad enough to justify me switching to linux, exactly because of those softwares
it's odd in a way, because the free software for windows is generally higher in quality that the one I find on linux.
And Gimp will never replace paint.net. Inkscape also have a very difficult UI.
(Some searching suggests that DeaDBeeF might be an even closer match these days, but it was brand new and I didn't hear about it back then.)
But Inkscape's UI seems pretty intuitive?
It's more of a graphic program for game design, but still very good in my opinion. And multiplatform, so usable on Windows and Linux as well.
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[0]: https://github.com/aseprite/aseprite/
[1]: https://www.aseprite.org/faq/#can-i-sell-graphics-created-wi...
If you want a cross-platform photo editing tool, give it a try!
Others will prefer to go the subscription fee route to get rid of them.
Some others will look at the ads and just decide to use software without anything like that in the first place, something truly free.
I think it's nice that we get the choice and that there's enough software out there for that to be the case. At the same time, if developers are successfully monetizing web based software, I wonder why that's not the case for desktop software.
I remember using a program called RaiDrive (https://www.raidrive.com/) to mount ext4 volumes through SFTP on a Windows machine and it worked pretty well, however they had an ad banner at the top of the window which seemed oddly fitting for a free version of software with lots of functionality, but maybe that's just due to me being used to ads everywhere nowadays (albeit uBlock Origin and Pi-hole exist).
There was a Paint.net fork (called Paint mono), but it is not Pinta. Pinta is a clone. From the original Pinta author: https://jpobst.blogspot.com/2010/02/over-holiday-break-i-stu...
"Pinta is a clone of Paint.NET."
No affiliation, just something I have used.
Absolute mastercraft of a software.
Upd: looks like it might be possible in the future [1]
[1]: https://invent.kde.org/graphics/kolourpaint/-/merge_requests...
I love paint.net. Recently purchased a windows store license for it. Clearly a winner for most of the image editing needs I have, for things like basic cropping, dpi changes, or changing formats. I treat it like I did GraphicConverter on Mac. Just a beloved image tool.
Lately I’ve been using it for simple file conversion with roll20, to hand-tune my assets for small downloads with webp.
The project was originally started by WSU (Washington State University)'s Rick Brewster and his team with backed MSFT.
But it wasn't adopted for Windows.
I recall trying Gimp 2.99 with the new UI some years ago (they take their time don't they) and finally liking it a lot. I would love for it to get a popularity boost like Blender did.
> Initially, Paint.NET was released under a modified version of the MIT License, with the exclusion of the installer, text, and graphics.[7] However, citing issues with the open source code being plagiarized by others that had rebranded the software as their own and bundled user content without their permission, the availability of the source code was restricted, in December 2007 Brewster announced his intent to restrict access to components of the program (including its installer, resources, and user interface).[8] In November 2009, the software was made proprietary, restricting the sale or creation of derivative works of the software.[8][9] [[1]]
I quit using it when it wasn't anymore.
I now use Pixelmator Pro on macOS, and I love it, but it isn't FOSS. Price was OK though. Is it the best? I don't know.
The other one I love is MusicBee, which is a fantastic music library organizer and player.
I always try to pick open source options when they're available, but these two apps are so great it's hard to find a replacement.
Bit the bullet and now I full time use Krita and Linux Mint. But it doesn't stop me from pulling it open anytime I need to do work on a Windows PC. Great for Cg (with its builtin .dds support!) and texture work (.vtf and other plugins)
The community has been good to me. Good piece of software.
If you just want a MS Paint replacement, KolourPaint[1] is the way to go
[0] https://krita.org/en/ [1] https://apps.kde.org/en-gb/kolourpaint/
I also use XPaint; it's quite capable but the interface is very different, too much deviated from usual GUI apps.
Anyhow, the only paint program I've used in years. I consider it to be the modern Deluxe Paint ][. Can't get anyone to use it though, because they're all clueless normies stuck in the belief they need to use PhotoShop for everything.
If that makes no sense to you, consider the insane amount of people who buy an expensive DSLR, because they believe it makes them better photographers. Hint: It doesn't.
I've had web developers hear "paint.net" and think Microsoft Paint (maybe the ".net" makes them think Microsoft), and why am I using something so basic?
> insane amount of people who buy an expensive DSLR
I'm not with you at all on that one. DSLR sales have plummeted every year for the last decade. "Normies", as you put it, think their smartphone camera is a high-end camera and all they could possibly ever need for taking top-quality photographs. The appalling noise their tiny sensors produce seems to have become so normalised, they don't even notice.
- It is not open source.
- It does only run on Windows.
Alternatives include Krita, Pinta and The GIMP.
https://betanews.com/2006/02/27/interview-a-look-inside-pain...
I wonder if the younger generation still make time for things like this. Wouldn't have happened without Paint.NET, I was too conscientious to pirate Photoshop.
it runs extremely fast on any modern windows box
I haven't used paint.net in like a decade(maybe 2 decades). I didn't like the interface at all. And it seemed to heavily rely on .NET graphics APIs, which are fine, I guess. Hopefully it's improved since then. Doesn't sound like it. Closed source now? Meh.
I can't say I understand the strategy, there are enough painting programs for Windows (which they even seem to focus on extra much on the frontpage of the website too) yet they are donation based but exclude other platforms.
I tried multiple alternatives, including Krita, which was the most decent. But its layout, speed, colorschemes, behaviors and some visual bugs are meh compared to subj. The most annoying is its content window black-flash when the cursor crosses the border.
Btw, does someone know a good SD webui plugin for PDN?