PixBuilder Studio which has recently been released in version 2 is a freeware alternative for Windows. The program on first glance seems to offer a similar functionality as Paint.Net.

You can associate image file extensions with the program during installation, which would speed things up if you do a lot of photo editing on your computer.

You find the usual assortment of tools lined up in the main interface of the program. One interesting option is the ability to move the tools panel around. You can for instance place it under the File toolbar instead of the left sidebar. There is unfortunately no option to make it a floating toolbar as Paint.Net does.

Toolbars in image editors seem to use more or less the same standard when it comes to which tools are provided there. Pixbuilder Studio is not different in this regard. You find the most popular tools there. The right side displays all other panels. This includes the zoom panel, an undo panel, custom tools panel to customize the selected tool or a list of channels.

Many options are only available under the main File toolbar at the top of the program window. This includes a huge list of color tools and effects. The program supports all my requirements (including blur) and then a lot more for users who want to dive deeper into image editing.

The program supports only a handful of formats, which can be a issue, especially for photographers who want to edit Raw images. Support are jpeg, gif, png, psd and a handful of lesser used formats.

I suggest you take a look at the developer website which lists the core program features and offers download links. PixBuilder Studio is compatible with all recent 32-bit and 64-bit versions of the Windows operating system.

The program can be a viable alternative for users who do not want to install Paint.Net because of its dependence on the Microsoft .Net Framework.

Pictures are added via the Main > Add Images menu which opens the folder browser. All images of the selected folder are automatically added to the program. Images in subdirectories are automatically included as well. The images are then processed and displayed as thumbnails in the interface. Users need to be cautious in this step as the program can run out of memory if to many large sized images are added.

The core features of Image Tools are all available under the Process menu at the top of the application window.

The following options are available:

• Channels filtering
• Convert
• Crop
• Deborder
• Flip / Rotate
• Resize
• Watermark
• To Grayscale / Negative / Sepia

The user begins the process by selecting one, multiple or all images with the mouse or the Select all button. All selected images are then processed by the application after an image manipulation option has been selected from the Process menu. Configuration begins with the selection of the output folder before available options are displayed in an extra window.

Image Tools is a handy tool for users who want to make one change to multiple images.

A few aspects are not perfect on the other hand. The program lacks previews of the selected change and does not contain options to make multiple changes at once. Users who would like to resize and watermark images would have to load the original images, select resize, load the resized images and select watermark from the options to complete the process.

Image Tools is a free image manipulation software for 32-bit and 64-bit editions of the windows operating system. The application is portable on systems that have the Microsoft .NET Framework 4.0 installed.

Image editing software programs like Seamonster make it now possible to reduce the size of images without loosing to much of its quality. Take a look at the following image to get a better understanding of the technique involved if you have not seen it before.

Seamonster is a demonstration of this technique. It is a image editing software for the Windows operating system that requires the Microsoft .net Framework 2.0. Images can be loaded into the interface that consists of a preview area and a sidebar on the right containing the image editing tools.

The tools can be used to carve or squash the image by pressing the buttons of the same name. Several parameters can be defined in the sidebar from the seam function to bias mode and energy function.

The techniques can be applied horizontally, vertically or optimal which will select the best direction automatically.

It does not look like this software is going to be updated by the developer in the near future as it was build in 2007. It does work surprisingly well though although it is missing some features like manual selection of areas that should be removed first.