Photoshop may be the most powerful photo touch-up software, but it isn’t the simplest to use. And the simplest ones? They’re not so powerful.
But photo-software makers are releasing products that fall between the two. Some are stand-alone versions of programs most often used to add features to Photoshop, called plug-ins. Others are upgraded versions of phone or tablet photo apps.
Among the most recent releases are two higher-powered versions of well-known phone and tablet apps, CameraBag and Snapseed.
A control panel from CameraBag 2.CameraBag became best known as an app that adds visual effects to smartphone photos, like making a picture look as though it had been taken with a Holga toy camera. But a desktop version called CameraBag 2 for the Mac and PC does a lot more using similar controls. Instead of just adding effects, it lets you customize those effects and even simplifies color and exposure corrections.
For beginners, the simple way to use CameraBag 2 is “Quicklooks,” which shows examples of how the photo you took will look if you use the more than 100 filters and controls, like exposure and contrast, as well as more advanced controls like luminance curves.
Once you have used one of the controls or effects, a box appears under the picture with the name of each filter or control you’ve used. That way you can remove anything in a single step, or go back and further adjust that step.
You can finish your work off with a border, such as one that makes your photo look as if it were a 35 mm slide in a white paper mount.
The program isn’t quite as easy as it might be. There are a lot of different ways you can get to the same effects panel, which can make it confusing to remember how you got there. It also lacks a “save” button, instead requiring you to go to a menu, pick a size and rename the files to save them.
The desktop app is priced at $29 online, currently discounted to $24. A Mac-only version through the Mac App store is $24, currently discounted to $19.
Snapseed, the phone and tablet version of software from Nik, best known for its Photoshop plug-ins, is also being offered in a Mac desktop version.
In some ways it has fewer options and controls than the CameraBag product, but there is one important difference. Snapseed has a feature called “control points,” which let you apply touch-ups to selected areas of a photo, instead of the whole picture. So you might choose to lighten a shadow on a subject’s face, while leaving the rest of the photo moodily lit. The best way to learn to use them is by watching the videos on Nik’s site.
Snapseed also lets you make color corrections, add prefabricated effects like the gritty-looking “grunge” or apply selected amounts of effects like tilt-shift or vignetting.
Another nice touch — you can adjust the thickness of the borders around photos, as well as the effect within the frame. So with a border that has a light leak, you can increase the size of the leak or decrease it.
Photos can be loaded directly to Facebook or Flickr or shared by e-mail. Snapseed is $20 through the Mac App store.