Pixelmator started as a clever alternative for Photoshop on Mac. On iOS it is a delightful experience as well. A set of essential photo editing tools are complemented by surprising effects. The interaction concept is flexible, powerful, and a joy to use. Pixelmator iCloud integration works like a charm: You can start to edit on iPad and continue on Mac and vice versa.
Snapseed 2. It seems that google has waited for my recent post on Snapseed 1.6 to release a completely redesigned version of Snapseed.
One item checked off from my wish list: Snapseed contains multiple undo and multiple redo functionality including “re-adjusting the past”. Impressive. The rest of the redesign is debatable. The current state of the image is displayed full screen – much larger than before, which is good. You can even zoom in further to check the details. As a trade off the tools are accessible via a (+) control button to be revealed as an overlay. A simple GOMS analysis would show that this takes approx. twice as many steps to choose a filter compared to the interaction model in Snapseed 1.6 before. Of course, the filters have been reorganized and a couple of new tools are available. I will update this post when my first impression is no longer dominated by sorrow on the loss of the Grunge module. Right now it feels that Snapseed lost its personality.
[Update 29-May-15] Grunge is back. Yeah!
PS: The image above: Schulterblick am Schulterblatt
Snapseed 1.6 was a wonderful app for the post production of photos. The interaction model matches the properties of the touch tablet without being too fancy or too dumb. It is a joy to control and witness the process in which the pixels develop into some pieces of art; my Snapseed portraits.
On my wish list: better undo or even version management. In fact Undo does not exists and Revert propels you back to the stage when the image was first opened.
Warning: If you love the current Grunge module do not update to Snapseed 2 b/c google made the unfortunate decision to remove it.
The image above: Sol & Glenn
Popsicolor is a photo filter app to create water color half tone images. You have to choose a pair of colors and a few other settings to turn your photos into something special. In the works above: sophia two-tone
Only caveat: use the latest hardware b/c rendering is not the fastest for playful experimenting.