Although adobe has not in its infinite wisdom decided to port ether Photoshop or Fireworks over to Linux, there are alternatives that offer some most of the functionality of both Photoshop and Fireworks on the Linux system.
My predicament was that although I loved using the adobe suite for design I was finding the cost prohibitively expensive and had wanted to move lock stock and barrel over to Ubuntu as my main operating system, leaving windows in my dark and distant past , but the only thing stopping me was the lack of Adobe Photoshop or Fireworks on the Linux system. Now I must admit that I use Photoshop on rare occasions but have developed what can only be described as a love affair with Fireworks, I just love how it works and the pre-set styles that make designing websites a joy
Alternative Solutions
I trawled the internet looking for alternative and the most common suggestion were Gimp and Inkscape (both Free) The Gimp was OK but found the interface just a little hard to get used to and abandoned that direction quite quickly There are some people that swear to the power of the Gimp, I may revisit and try again when I have more time.
Inkscape was looking pretty basic when I first launched it. Over time I have developed a huge respect for this powerful tool, the basic look was just a misconception underneath this plain Jane exterior laid a seething powerhouse of graphic passion. Before long I was creating designs just like in Fireworks, granted It lacked some of the time saving effects but this made the transition more fun as I had to find workarounds to accomplish things that in Fireworks could be done at the push of a button, this I believe has made me a better designer.
Now for the cream of a Photoshop alternative
Photoshop has developed what can only be called a cult following it is without doubt the top of the food chain when it comes to photo editing and graphic design. It has even injected itself into our language with terms like “the image has been photoshoped”
I believe I have stumbled across the best alternative to Photoshop on a Linux system, Pixel. Pixel has been written by one lone person Pavel Kanzelsberger the more I use this software the more impressed I am at this moment in time it is in beta 7 and although not free, represents great value for money at only $50 or 33 Euro’s this is not far off of the quality of Photoshop once it reaches version one the price will rise so for a great bargain go check it out
Date:21-02-2009
OK its now a few month later and I have had time to play around with Gimp
Now I see why people make such a fuss of gimp I am using 2.6 and am now getting along great with it, I’ve stopped using Pixel altogether (except when I need some tricky slicing done) and am very impressed by Gimp. If I had continued using the previous version I dont think I would have become such a fan, the interface improvements have done a world ogf good for the program.
Overview of Photoshop and Fireworks alternatives
For vector graphics it has to be Inkscape, I now use this fantastic app for all my web design layout and for bitmap editing I use Gimp , In the future I intend to make a tutorial movie on how to design a web page using Inkscape, Gimp , Kompozer and Bluefish so stay tuned. The next article I will write will be about Adobe Dreamweaver alternaives on Linux