My Top Three Online Photo Editors

Adobe's Photoshop is the most well known photo editing software program in the world. Professional image manipulators and digital artists skilled in its use are capable of creating images that dazzle and impress. But, for the casual user, using Photoshop can be daunting. While the professional user needs access to the thousands of filters available in Photoshop's repertoire, the casual user doesn't. For most users, freely available online photo editors are all they need to touch up photos and make them look their best. This article will examine and compare the positives and negatives of my top three online photo editors.

#1 - Adobe Photoshop Express

Adobe Photoshop Express is a free online version of Photoshop created by Adobe for casual users. While it lacks many of the filters available in the full version of Photoshop, the Photoshop Express has all the essentials covered.

The main features include:

Levels can be manipulated to ensure that black levels are consistent in a photo
Hue, saturation and colour can be changed to affect the mood of a photo
Red eye can be eliminated by using a special filter
Blur and sharpen filters
Crop and rotate tools to improve photo composition

Photoshop Express also comes with a 'decorate' function that allows for speech bubbles, titles and other text decorations to be added to a picture.

Photoshop Express also has a newer, simpler interface that takes no more than a few minutes to learn. The interface is quick, responsive and free of advertising, with menus and functions laid out in a simple and intuitive manner. Uploading photos to manipulate is a cinch while inbuilt social networking features make it easy to share photos to websites like Facebook, Picasa and Flickr.

#2 - Pixlr

Pixlr is a powerful online photo editor with a number of tools and filters. While Photoshop Express discarded certain filters and tools in favour of an easier to use user interface, Pixlr features a wide range of tools and filters designed to help make photographs look better.

As well as the tools and filters listed above (see Photoshop Express section), Pixlr also contains:

Filters, including vintage photo filters designed to age the look of a photograph
The ability to manipulate photos using layers
Typography and shape effects
Clone stamp

This added functionality comes at a cost, however. Pixlr's user interface is not as intuitive and easy to use as Photoshop Express, making it more difficult to learn to use. Pixlr also lacks some of the social networking features that Photoshop Express has.

#3 - Picmonkey

Picmonkey is a powerful online photo editor that features both an easy to use, intuitive interface as well as a number of powerful effects and filters. Effects and patterns can be applied to photographs, as can text captions. Photo frames and clip art can also be added to photographs while photographs can also be fine tuned using a number of menus. Certain features such as the ability to alter levels, saturation and hue are absent, however.

Like Photoshop Express, Picmonkey also has a number of social media features built in that make it easy to share photographs to friends and family.

Conclusion

All three of these online photo editors are powerful and very capable at manipulating photographs. Photoshop Express is ideal for those who are looking for a simple, no-nonsense photo editor that'll allow minor touch ups, while Pixlr allows more advanced users to make minute changes to photographs. Picmonkey sits firmly in the middle of the two, offering powerful features with an easy to use interface. Make sure to try all three of these photo editors out to find out which one suits you best.

Colin McDonald writes on behalf Steven Brooks Wedding Photography