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I am just getting into photography as a hobby, and am looking for some good tools for image uploading/browsing/editing.

I am currently using the Canon EOS utility that came with the camera for uploading, Picasa for browsing, and GIMP for editing.

Pros:

  • The files are stored using the standard file system (no proprietary library like iPhoto)
  • Great photo editing possibilities
  • Free (except the Canon Utility, but that was bundled)

Cons:

  • Multiple programs
  • Hard to view the Exif Data (I like the way that iPhoto displays the data)
  • Over-simplified editing tools in Picasa

What other tools should I look into?

Also, I occasionally shoot in RAW, and would prefer Mac support (better monitor), but I also have windows and linux machines.

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Those w/ extensive Lightroom or Aperture experience, feel free to chime in. – hyperslug Sep 15 '09 at 15:38
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I usually recommend AGAINST installing the software that comes with cameras. The companies are great at making hardware, but suck at software. Picasa can import both compressed and RAW photos great. – Will Eddins Sep 15 '09 at 17:23
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11 Answers

up vote 7 down vote accepted

Actually, Picasa can import photos itself (including several RAW formats, as suggested by mgb in comment), and provides a range of basic editing functions, like cropping, or reworking the colors.

It is probably not enough for the editing part, but in my opinion, the uploading part is good enough, unless you need more advanced features, maybe, that the Canon utility provides.

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I had noticed the image uploading, but I haven't gotten around to using it since I'm not too thrilled with the editing options they gave me... – chills42 Sep 15 '09 at 15:09
Well, at least if you like to use it for browsing, using it for importing too would save you the use of the Canon utility. But I agree that editing options from Picasa are minimal, to only manipulate the photo with rotation, crops, brightness and other small "ready" effects. That's enough if your photos only need a bit of white balance tweak, or crop, but if you actually want to edit the image, you need something like photoshop. – Gnoupi Sep 15 '09 at 15:18
Picasa handles most raw formats see picasa.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=15625 for list – Martin Beckett Nov 19 '09 at 17:45
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up vote 8 down vote

Whilst Gimp is a good alternative, I have found nothing better than Photoshop when it comes down to "just getting it done".

Also, for quick editing I am liking Lightroom more and more

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As an event photographer, LR is fantastic. I hardly touch Photoshop anymore. Of course, it all depends on what kind of photography you're doing – prestomation Sep 15 '09 at 15:44
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Photoshop is awesome, but I just can't justify the cost as a hobbyist... – chills42 Sep 15 '09 at 21:38
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You should see if you can get a deal. As far as GIMP has come, it can't hold a candle to Photoshop. – emgee Sep 21 '09 at 2:39
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up vote 5 down vote

I started with GIMP on Linux and later added Picasa on a Windows box too, back in 2004. Later I moved to a Mac with Photoshop — CS2 at the time. I worked my way up to CS3 in Photoshop and then got Lightroom. I just upgraded to Lightroom 2. I don't use anything else anymore. So my vote, unless you are going to do things a la Deviant Art type works — drastic manipulations/creation as opposed to digital 'development' — is to get a copy of Lightroom 2 for Mac. Downside is you will need two copies for Windows/Mac and there is no Linux version.

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+1 for Lightroom. – kevintechie Sep 15 '09 at 16:05
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up vote 4 down vote

It's not as good as Lightroom, but digiKam is a good open source app, under active development, with many of the features of Lightroom, and runs on Win/Linux/Mac: http://www.digiKam.org

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Looks pretty good, I'll have to take a look at it. – chills42 Sep 22 '09 at 17:10
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up vote 2 down vote

GIMP and Picasa are great for processing and managing pictures.
If you can get Lightroom or Aparture, its usually much more 'usable' than GIMP.
But, I am fine with GIMP in most cases.
Particularly, I like the ease of processing files across Windows and Linux.

Some plugins and accessories I use (typically around GIMP),
These are usually available across platforms and open source at Sourceforge.

  1. UFRaw -- Unidentified Flying Raw;
    to read and manipulate raw images from digital cameras
    • needs GTK platform
  2. ExifTool -- for meta data processing
    • needs Perl
  3. Hugin -- Panorama photo stitcher
    (i prefer this over bundled software or in-camera support)
  4. Qtpfsgui -- HDR Imaging
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+1 ExifTool is awesome. He also has non-Perl CLI versions for Win and Mac. See also ExifTool GUI (Win) - freeweb.siol.net/hrastni3/foto/exif/exiftoolgui.htm – Nathaniel Nov 19 '09 at 21:39
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up vote 2 down vote

Cam2pc does one thing that no other tool does, or does as good: automatically rename photos from CIMG3325.JPG to whatever path and pattern you define. Why is this not in Picasa?

I use cam2pc to download images from my camera onto harddisk following own my naming scheme (\photos\YYYY\YYYYMMDD hhmmss 'event'.'extension'). It will also fill EXIF artist and copyright fields.

I use Picasa 3.5 for sorting, editing, uploading, but until recently cam2pc was better even for that.

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up vote 1 down vote

I now prefer Windows Live Photo Gallery to Picasa, offers IMO better control over the editing, although still no Photoshop. Still, worth a look and way cheaper than Lightroom.

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If you're a Flickr user, then Windows Live Photo Gallery makes it super easy to browse and select images to upload to your Flickr account. – Steve Wortham Sep 15 '09 at 16:00
Except that tagging with Live Photo Gallery changes the files' timestamps, as far as my tests reveal. I prefer the timestamps to be left untouched unless I actually edit the images. – Torben Gundtofte-Bruun Oct 14 '09 at 7:57
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up vote 1 down vote

am I too late to answer this?

for editing, I use Faststone Image Viewer. It has a lot of cool features.

See if it meets ur requirements, if you have not already made up ur mind.

Download from here or here.

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up vote 0 down vote

What is your camera? If it happens to be a Nikon, then really, really consider Capture NX2. It is having one of the best quality RAW converters, almost reaching top-class levels like CaptureOne or DXO Optics, and way beyond the image quality of Aperture, Lightroom, Photoshop.

The price is very good too.

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up vote 0 down vote

As for me (Canon EOS 40D user) I'm currently using Windows Live Photo Gallery for importing and preview as well as throwing away bad images. I am struggling with Canon's Digital Photo Professional for raw editing; it's not a pleasant experience, though. But RawShooter Essentials doesn't like the 40D's raw format anymore.

For stitching I use the Microsoft Research Image Composite Edtor and basic editing (beyond what I do in WLPG or DPP I rarely do very much; I'm simply too lazy) such as adding a border to the picture I do in Paint.NET.

Mass conversion or resizing of images is usually done with nconvert.

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up vote 0 down vote

I recommend Zoner PhotoStudio. There are free and paid versions. Unfortunately, it's only for Windows.

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