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Help Stop Me from Going Back to Windows!

Big-TDI-Guy

Big-TDI-Guy

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Jan 11, 2007
2,606
13
Why isn't there an easy way to do some drawing/painting - photo cropping / cut / pasting / flipping and general B A S I C photo editing. (no Aperture or Photoshop needed) It is such a gaping hole within OSX.

Every time I have to re-size a picture (to make it smaller and email/web compliant) I have to boot up Parallels / XP to accomplish this.

I'm unable to find anything in OSX - even iPhoto - that would allow me to easily re-size a photo. Email has it - "Small / Medium / Large" settings - but not really helpful for this. And no drawing feature that I can find.

I've tried some OSX "free-paint" "core-paint" and all were VERY laggy (to the point seriously I question whether or not they even incorporated core services) Another problem is that they won't touch some picture formats (nothing exotic here) - but biggest problem is how unbelievably unstable the programs I've tried are. Not to knock Apple here - but I've NEVER had MS Paint crash on me. So at this point - I'd settle for a MS paint port (that works).

Any good recommendations for a paint / photo App? I can't justify the purchase of some ultra-complex software - and need something with a basic UI to get the job done.

I think I'd say 25-30 bones is my limit - but obviously free would be better.

TIA
 
Skitch beats Paint. In fact, Skitch massacres paint. I'm all outta invites, but sign up on plasq's site :)
 
;)

See - I search a Paint program and get nothing good. Ask for help, with no replies... But once I threaten to go back to M$ - I get the help.

For what it's worth - I only go back to Windoze via Parallels - that's as real as it gets for me. OSX has a LOOOONG way to fall before I consider going back. :D

Going to try that skitch program - TIA,

Crap - I eat Crow on part of my rant. I guess Preview.app does do some basic photo work - I went into the toolbar and "activated" all the buttons for it. I never used Preview for pictures because I thought it was just an Adobe reader. Oops.
 
Big-TDI-Guy said:
;)

See - I search a Paint program and get nothing good. Ask for help, with no replies... But once I threaten to go back to M$ - I get the help.

For what it's worth - I only go back to Windoze via Parallels - that's as real as it gets for me. OSX has a LOOOONG way to fall before I consider going back. :D

Going to try that skitch program - TIA,

Crap - I eat Crow on part of my rant. I guess Preview.app does do some basic photo work - I went into the toolbar and "activated" all the buttons for it. I never used Preview for pictures because I thought it was just an Adobe reader. Oops.
Click to expand...

The new Leopard Preview is a good deal more full featured (i wonder if this user account can use it [long story], yep it can... freaking LittleSnitch) than it was in Tiger, but you are right, we are in fact lacking a Paint alternative bundled with the OS.
 
With the size of my photo library - it takes iPhoto a good deal of time to get on it's feet (and sucks up a bit of system resources in the process) I wanted something fairly minimal for quick n' dirty photo work and sketching.

I'm hoping this Skitch program works well - and I now favor using Preview for the quick photo crops.
 
Why not just 'save as' the picture to a jpg format? That will make your picture smaller. And you can choose the size of the new file.
 
been owning my own mac for 10 days now, and i have been busy finding equivalent applications.

thus far, the first app that surprised me with joy would be iPhoto, which came in iLife '08, along with the other discs. i had to do a quick edit on some photos, and i didn't want to boot into windows at that time.

i had expected less out of it, but i found that i could do most of what i do in photoshop editing, and with more ease if you are not technical about it. that would be to straighten, resize, crop, colour correct and even remove blemishes!

the last one really caught me by surprise, as i was so used to the clone stamp tool in photoshop that i never thought it could be accomplished in iPhoto with literally one click.

one thing i am not too keen about is the amount of apps a mac need just to do something, and basic ones at times. maybe it just takes time to figure out which app is truly powerful and is a keeper.

i feel most power windows users who switch would feel a little crippled at times on a mac because if you have almost more than a decade worth of swift usability on windows and suddenly have little clue as to what's the most well-rounded tool for even un-archiving something, you would definitely feel a little impatient and demand nothing less than before. that is especially so when you really need to get something done right from the start and not fool around.

i understand that, so i'm just taking it like a new discovery for now. i'm sure we'll get there.
 
oYx said:
been owning my own mac for 10 days now, and i have been busy finding equivalent applications.

thus far, the first app that surprised me with joy would be iPhoto, which came in iLife '08, along with the other discs. i had to do a quick edit on some photos, and i didn't want to boot into windows at that time.

i had expected less out of it, but i found that i could do most of what i do in photoshop editing, and with more ease if you are not technical about it. that would be to straighten, resize, crop, colour correct and even remove blemishes!

the last one really caught me by surprise, as i was so used to the clone stamp tool in photoshop that i never thought it could be accomplished in iPhoto with literally one click.

one thing i am not too keen about is the amount of apps a mac need just to do something, and basic ones at times. maybe it just takes time to figure out which app is truly powerful and is a keeper.

i feel most power windows users who switch would feel a little crippled at times on a mac because if you have almost more than a decade worth of swift usability on windows and suddenly have little clue as to what's the most well-rounded tool for even un-archiving something, you would definitely feel a little impatient and demand nothing less than before. that is especially so when you really need to get something done right from the start and not fool around.

i understand that, so i'm just taking it like a new discovery for now. i'm sure we'll get there.
Click to expand...

What do you mean by the number of steps needed to do something? I have found that generally, I can accomplish things in fewer steps on OS X than I could have on Windows.

Do you have any examples of you taking too many steps, maybe help can be offered?
 
apps, not steps. :)

maybe i should have been specific and mention that the "more apps" scenario only applies in my case of playing audio and video files.

i hadn't expect there would be a lack of an all-rounder players with good usability, because when i worked on macs here and there over the years before finally getting my own (core 2 duo did it for me), my impression is that they were all pretty multimedia-oriented. however, i made my decision to buy a macbook pro because i could have both OSes on hardware that is reasonably powerful. also, i work audio and have to be mobile soon. for that, the macbook pro is really the most ideal.

i immediately miss the latest winamp with its bento 'skin'. i say 'skin' because it doesn't just look different for superficial reasons, but it helps organise my library so efficiently and it makes everything functionally neat at the same time. it also plays every audio format that i've ever run into. then there's foobar that converts almost any audio format to another. i know there are reports of people using darwine to run foobar on the mac, but i'd prefer to keep things simple but yet effective.

then there's the CCCP pack for windows. VLC is pretty neat, but the subtitle side of things don't look that good, and i haven't figured out how to customise it proper.

right now, i've installed cog, play and the perian pack. we all have itunes and quicktime. yet, the capabilities still feel just a little lacking. i'll continue to look around for sure.

i'm not trying to put the mac down though (or windows for that matter). in fact, i've been using the mac side much more than the windows side so far. last thing i want to do is start another mac-vs-windows thing. right now, i'll just wait patiently for the above-mentioned apps to get up to speed. :)
 
Big-TDI-Guy said:
Why isn't there an easy way to do some drawing/painting - photo cropping / cut / pasting / flipping and general B A S I C photo editing. (no Aperture or Photoshop needed) It is such a gaping hole within OSX.

Every time I have to re-size a picture (to make it smaller and email/web compliant) I have to boot up Parallels / XP to accomplish this.

I'm unable to find anything in OSX - even iPhoto - that would allow me to easily re-size a photo. Email has it - "Small / Medium / Large" settings - but not really helpful for this. And no drawing feature that I can find.

I've tried some OSX "free-paint" "core-paint" and all were VERY laggy (to the point seriously I question whether or not they even incorporated core services) Another problem is that they won't touch some picture formats (nothing exotic here) - but biggest problem is how unbelievably unstable the programs I've tried are. Not to knock Apple here - but I've NEVER had MS Paint crash on me. So at this point - I'd settle for a MS paint port (that works).

Any good recommendations for a paint / photo App? I can't justify the purchase of some ultra-complex software - and need something with a basic UI to get the job done.

I think I'd say 25-30 bones is my limit - but obviously free would be better.

TIA
Click to expand...

You do realise that you can resize the picture in preview as well as converting it to other formats?
 
oYx said:
apps, not steps. :)

maybe i should have been specific and mention that the "more apps" scenario only applies in my case of playing audio and video files.

i hadn't expect there would be a lack of an all-rounder players with good usability, because when i worked on macs here and there over the years before finally getting my own (core 2 duo did it for me), my impression is that they were all pretty multimedia-oriented. however, i made my decision to buy a macbook pro because i could have both OSes on hardware that is reasonably powerful. also, i work audio and have to be mobile soon. for that, the macbook pro is really the most ideal.

i immediately miss the latest winamp with its bento 'skin'. i say 'skin' because it doesn't just look different for superficial reasons, but it helps organise my library so efficiently and it makes everything functionally neat at the same time. it also plays every audio format that i've ever run into. then there's foobar that converts almost any audio format to another. i know there are reports of people using darwine to run foobar on the mac, but i'd prefer to keep things simple but yet effective.

then there's the CCCP pack for windows. VLC is pretty neat, but the subtitle side of things don't look that good, and i haven't figured out how to customise it proper.

right now, i've installed cog, play and the perian pack. we all have itunes and quicktime. yet, the capabilities still feel just a little lacking. i'll continue to look around for sure.

i'm not trying to put the mac down though (or windows for that matter). in fact, i've been using the mac side much more than the windows side so far. last thing i want to do is start another mac-vs-windows thing. right now, i'll just wait patiently for the above-mentioned apps to get up to speed. :)
Click to expand...

Well, Perian is a good start, and the reason (I would imagine) that you are having trouble skinning individual apps on OS X is because 'we' like things to all look the same, and all conform to the HIG as closely as possible. This isn't Windows where even Microsoft made programs fail to match each other.

You might want to check out ffmpegx, if it is still being developed, it was good at converting things.

Also, I understand where you are coming from, you have to re-think your workflow, it is a little rocky at first, but you should come out of it ok.
 
as if something like cropping a picture is worth switching to windows. :rolleyes:

just research a little. and yes preview in leopard is good for this. as well as many other free third party tools outthere.
 
again, i didn't say that i wanted to skin anything. i prefer my workspace to appear as consistent as possible, and if i do skin anything in windows, it's to get it as utilitarian as possible without the fluff. :)

when i mentioned 'skin', it's just referring to the latest winamp and its new default skin which was really done more for functional reasons than superficial, hence the single quotes around skin because while it's technically a skin, it had good purpose not usually associated with skinning.

workflow-wise, it has been pretty good for me. didn't have much problems when i switched over. i think it's all about organising your generated data properly, and mentally knowing how to approach a piece of work before going in.

which indirectly reminds me of this.. one thing i really like about mac os x that helped me decide on getting mac is the way user folders are organised. it's easy to see how neat the user space is. i've never ever set any computer up for multi-users, but i shudder to think of how to keep it proper in windows.

thanks for the recommendation for ffmpegx. i'll check it out soon.
 
Big-TDI-Guy said:
Why isn't there an easy way to do some drawing/painting - photo cropping / cut / pasting / flipping and general B A S I C photo editing. (no Aperture or Photoshop needed) It is such a gaping hole within OSX.
Click to expand...
You're dead on. I've been grumbling about this since buying my first Mac this summer. It's nonsensical that the "creative" platform doesn't have a sub-$100 hobbyist graphics app. There's nothing out there comparable to Paint Shop Pro or Photo Impact on the PC.

The new Acorn, Pixelmator, and some others look promising. But they're immature compared to the highly featured PC programs. And Photoshop Elements is two version behind on the Mac.

The best free app I've found is Seashore. It's a decent little app and does the basics.

So to fix your problem: For trivial matters, I use Seashore. For bigger jobs I boot into Parallels and use a 7 year old version of PhotoImpact. You can try Acorn and Pixelmator. You can use the abomination called GIMP. You can wait and hope PS Elements gets an upgrade. You can buy Photoshop.

Wish there was a good solution.
 
DaveF said:
You're dead on. I've been grumbling about this since buying my first Mac this summer. It's nonsensical that the "creative" platform doesn't have a sub-$100 hobbyist graphics app. There's nothing out there comparable to Paint Shop Pro or Photo Impact on the PC.

The new Acorn, Pixelmator, and some others look promising. But they're immature compared to the highly featured PC programs. And Photoshop Elements is two version behind on the Mac.

So to fix your problem: I boot into Parallels and use a 7 year old version of PhotoImpact. You can try Acorn and Pixelmator. You can use the abomination called GIMP. You can wait and hope PS Elements gets an upgrade. You can buy Photoshop.

Wish there was a good solution.
Click to expand...

-OR- you can actually read this thread before posting to it. :p

Although Skitch is still in a limited beta by invitation only it is an EXCELLENT solution for drawing/painting/photo-resizing/sending/receiving photos and pictures (which is what the OP was looking for and what this thread is about).

Put in your e-mail address at http://plasq.com/skitch and give it a try. You might wait a week or two but I think you'll be glad you did especially if you have an Intel Mac.

When it's officially released this program is going to be a huge hit.
 
SaSaSushi said:
-OR- you can actually read this thread before posting to it. :p

Although Skitch is still in a limited beta by invitation only it is an EXCELLENT solution for drawing/painting/photo-resizing/sending/receiving photos and pictures (which is what the OP was looking for and what this thread is about).

Put in your e-mail address at http://plasq.com/skitch and give it a try. You might wait a week or two but I think you'll be glad you did especially if you have an Intel Mac.

When it's officially released this program is going to be a huge hit.
Click to expand...

Okay - allow me to update my finding.

SaSaSushi steered me over to Skitch - and it is doing EXACTLY as I wanted - interface is a "little" light - but again, it accomplishes what I needed in spades. (quick and dirty drawing and editing in OSX)

What won me over so much with Skitch - is it is the Dogs Bollocks when it comes to ease of use and simplicity. It Automatically found my iphoto Library - and Loads it (#*$ing FASTER than iPhoto. So I can grab a pic, crop it, put in callouts - touch up, and dump it straight online in seconds (even has online storage / sharing integrated - should you wish to use it). Even supports I-sight capture direct into the software.

I tried GIMP - and that thing was garbage - unstable - just no good to me. Also tried Core-Draw (or something to that extent) that too was so buggy I could not use it.

Other free drawing programs were SLLLLLLOW to react and do anything, if they didn't crash. Some would not launch at all on my Intel, and others were "semi-functional" but confusing / excessively complicated interfaces.

I haven't gotten to completely explore Skitch - but I must say - if there was a basic paint program to integrate into OSX - this would be it. It has Apple simplicity and intuitive structure, and so far - has been solid. It appears to integrate some core effects (not sure about the actual drawing itself) but in trays / menus / level functions. I will happily shell out some green to keep this down the road.

I have Corel Draw on my Parallels side - but it's overkill for 98% of what I do, and not really so gentle on Parallels. So prior to Skitch - I copied files over to Parallels and used MS Paint - then copied back to OSX again. It was kinda silly. (though Kudos to Parallels for making file sharing so seamless)

I would not mind a powerful program like Photoshop - but it is just too much money for my needs.

I've grown tired of "re-learning how to walk" with new iterations of paint and photo software - my brain is full - and I'd rather waste my time creating - then trying to figure out how to use the software.
 
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