• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Home
  • About
  • Fav Books
  • Tools
  • Journal
  • Hire Me
  • Contact
Small Biz Geek

Small Biz Geek

Small Business Design, Marketing & Technology Journal

Website design services

A Journal on Small Business Design, Marketing and Technology

  • The Internet
  • Marketing
  • Graphic Design
  • Web Dev
  • Web Design
  • Social Media
  • Technology
  • Miscellaneous

Paint.Net – Free Photoshop Alternative

You are here: Home / Darren’s Small Business Tools / Paint.Net – Free Photoshop Alternative

Paint.Net

If you want something a bit like Photoshop – but free – you could try out Paint.Net.

The program has many similar features to Photoshop including typesetting, brushes, colour fill, marquee selection, clone stamp, layers and filter effects.

Colours, brightness, contrast and more is available.

Paint.Net shouldn’t be confused with the bog standard Windows Paint that comes with every Microsoft operating system.

Paint.New Start Menu

What I am talking about is open source graphics editor similar to Gimp, but more user friendly. The installation file is small and the software fast.

paint-net-open-image

As Good as Photoshop?

It’s not as good as Photoshop. No way. Photoshop is the King of bitmap image editors.

But if you’re not looking for very advanced features and just need basic image editing, adjustment and export, you’ll probably be very pleased with Paint.Net.

Colour Values for Web Design

Being a web design guy, one thing that always interests me with image editing programs is their capability for displaying colour information.

  • What I should have said there was color instead of colour (that’s a CSS reference ;)).

Colour Values

Because we need Hex colors and RGB values for our CSS stylesheets it’s always handy to be able to grab those values.

Using the Paint.Net eye dropper tool it’s possible to sample images/graphics/colours/whatever and get the info required.

The value of the colour is displayed in the image shown above. Using this information I can swap out one colour for another in my website code.

I copy and paste the hex value (#FF77EC for example) and perform a find and replace in my stylesheet.

CSS Stylesheet Color Hex Value

Photoshop handles all this stuff too but it’s always interesting to see how the open source counterparts compare. If something happened to my copy of Photoshop it would be good knowing Paint.Net is a fall back option.

Support

The forums are the place for you to find support if you need it. With this being an open source application you’re not going to get customer service in the way you would with a paid product.

User ManualUse the forums to join in with the community and everyone will help each other in a give and take capacity.

There is of course a user manual. It is worth reading this.

If you’re already familiar with Photoshop, you’ll pick things up pretty quickly because the principles are the same.

Plugins

Compared to Photoshop, Paint.Net is pretty basic.

It offers the bare minimum of features but this is where the plugins come in.

Because the software is open source, developers will often create free plugins which you can install to add extra functionality.

For example, one drawback I found is that the colour mode cannot be changed to CMYK, meaning it operates in a default RGB mode.

However, because this is an open source application, there might be a free plugin that can change the colour mode to CMYK.

If you’re only using the application for screen based images, printed colour accuracy might not be all that important, in which case you can ignore it altogether and stick to RGB.

Otherwise, search the plugins subforum to see if anyone has created a plugin that performs the functions you need.

Do you want to draw/import vector paths and create .SVG files in Paint.Net? Have a look at this vector paths plugin and follow the instructions for installation.

Download Paint.Net Free

Try out the software for yourself and see how you get on with it.

Check out the features or just go straight to the download page.

If you have any tips, thoughts or questions, comment below!

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Sally Heritage says

    April 13, 2015 at 4:48 pm

    I’m downloading now! Not much of a graphic designer myself so wish me luck!

    Loving your website design by the way! ๐Ÿ™‚

    Reply
    • Small Biz Geek says

      April 15, 2015 at 9:20 pm

      Cheers Sally! Good luck!

      Reply

Add Your Thoughts Cancel reply

Your email address is safe and will NOT be shared with anyone else.

Hateful, spammy or abusive comments will not be tolerated.

For more information please see the comment policy.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Primary Sidebar

About the Webmaster

Hello, my name is Darren, a 36-year-old business enthusiast eager to learn and do good work.

I’m a website builder for hire working with small to medium businesses.

Search Website

Let’s Connect

  • LinkedIn
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Recently Read Book

Don't Make Me think - Steve Krug

“Don’t Make Me Think: Revisited” – Steve Krug (Book Review)

A person of average technical ability must be able to navigate your website easily. This is required reading for anyone wanting to create a better experience for their visitors…

Latest Journal Entries

  • Computer Says No: Does Your Website Work for People with Disabilities?
  • Chinese Tinder Profiles Are Using Photos of Pretty Girls to Scam “Investors”
  • Small Biz Owners “Trapped” Using Email Addresses Belonging to Internet Service Providers
  • In the Pandemic, QR Codes are Finally Proving Worthy in the West
  • Small Businesses Finally Start Marketing and All It Took Was a Global Pandemic
  • Unable to Meet in Person? Communicate Stress-Free with Online Audio/Video
  • UK Contractors Operating Ltd Companies Should Be Mad as Hell with HMRC and IR35
  • 20 Years On and Website Hit Counters are Still a Waste of Pixels
  • Competitors Can Easily Edit Your Google and Facebook Business Listings
  • Waiting on Final Images for a WordPress Website? Use Temporary Placeholders and Design Around Them
  • GoDaddy Loves Spamming Branded Footer Links to WordPress Installatron Sites
  • Dealing with Negative Comments on Your Paid Social Media Posts

Footer

Primary Navigation

Home
About Darren
Good Books
My Tools
Blog Posts
Hire Me
Contact Me

Secondary Navigation

The Internet
Marketing
Graphic Design
Website Development
Website Design
Social Media
Technology
Miscellaneous

Derby & Nottingham Area

Small Biz Geek
Office 897
109 Vernon House
Friar Lane
Nottingham
NG1 6DQ

Telephone

Tel: +44 (0) 115 714 3290
Tel: +44 (0) 7951 897 243

VoIP

Skype: ilkestonwebdesign
WhatsApp: 07519 897 243

Email

[email protected]

Let’s Connect

Twitter
YouTube
LinkedIn
RSS

Subscribe to Blog by Email

Subscribe to Blog By Email

Social Calendar

WordPress Nottingham Meetup
WordPress Derby Meetup
Genesis Framework by StudioPress


Copyright © 2021 · Small Biz Geek · Privacy Policy · Commenting Policy · Website Disclaimer · ICO number: ZA305900


Written and designed by Ilkeston Web Design

This site uses cookies More info