#i realize procreate feels a lot more traditional compared to photoshop

[evelynmlewis]

List of Photoshop Alternatives in 2024

Rebelle 7

Why to use it: It is a traditional painting emulator software with a lot of capabilities that mirror photoshop and some unique features as well.

Pros: This is my absolute top recommendation with the ability to use realistic watercolors, paper textures, paint mixing, metal textures, state of the art blending, phsyics simulation etc. and every aspect of each brush is customizable including the pressure curves. Has your basic digital capabilities as well. Has most things photoshop has and some great ruler and stencil tools as well. Has liquefy tools photoshop doesn't have. Amazing perspective tools.

Cons: The Pro version costs $150 at full price and the regular version is $90. However, they often go on sale around holidays or deep discount on Cyber Monday. Vectors have to be imported and brush size only goes up to about half what you would want for a large file.

Sketchable

Why to use it: I'll call it a basic digital drawing program. It does have some more sophisticated settings hidden in it. It allows you to create "books" of drawings and flip between them.

Pros: Immersive if you want to feel like you just sat down with a sketchbook.

Cons: Weird interface feels unsuited to professional digital work. It's like it's trying to be a traditional artwork simulator without any of the features of a simulator. Also the weird pixel smoothing thing where the canvas just gets blurry when you zoom in instead of being pixellated feels like a con to me although I realize it's part of the immersion. Costs $20 although there's apparently a free version now.

Clip Studio Paint

Why to use it: Digital Painting program specialized in anime and manga/comic creation apparently.

Pros and cons: I don't know much about it myself I'll admit because I haven't used it, but it costs $50.

Procreate

Why to use it: Digital painting software designed for stylus.

Pros: has a lot of users and hence a lot of brushes, comparable even to photoshop in brush offerings or so I hear.

Cons: Only for iOS.

Paint Tool SAi

Why to use it: Free painting and blending software.

Pros and cons: Free but doesn't have marquee tools or vector shapes according to @vio1315, ask her.

Affinity Suite

Why to use it: Closest competitor to Adobe. Affinity Photo is the one that's supposed to be comparable to photoshop, although I haven't used it. It's for photo editing.

Pros: In my experience Affinity products are absolutely comparable in functionality to Adobe in every way.

Cons: Costs $35 per app. But that's like the montly CC subscription and this is a one time purchase. As far as I know Affinity Photo is more focused on the photography aspects than the painting aspects.

Photopea

Why to use it: Like photoshop, but online and free.

Pros: Online and free.

Cons: slow because it runs in the browser and the paint brush is awful to use because it runs in the browser.

Gimp

Why to use it: don't

Cons: awful and horrid user-unfriendly interface. Scales badly on hi-res monitors and doesn't have the newer types of features you're used to. Not even a true photoshop alternative.

Krita

Why to use it: A drawing program with animation capabilities

Pros: Decent and ok brush editing etc. It's free and open source. Has raster animation capabilities, which is a good reason to download.

Cons: Afaik no pressure curve editing like Rebelle has, and small brush size iirc. But it's a very decent free program. No native gif exporting, you have to install a plugin.

Anyone have that post with a list of alternatives with Photoshop? Could use it now and idk where I lost it

[moonavem]

Trying out Procreate