We take a look at some of the best free open-source graphic design tools to help you learn the skills of visual design.
Commercial graphic design tools can be quite expensive. Unfortunately, in order to become a leader in graphic design Midlands, you have to have access to state-of-the-art tools. Luckily, the open source community has been hard at work developing tools that are just as good as the proprietary commercial software on the market. The following are some complete solutions that are great for graphic and web development work.
Inkscape
This program makes use of the SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) format. It features an intuitive user interface that is very user friendly. Quite similar to Illustrator and CorelDraw, Inkscape performs just about every graphic design activity you could ever think of e.g. alpha blending, clone brushing, rescaling, node tracing and much more.
Gimp
This cross-platform suite is highly advanced and can be downloaded from the Gimp website. You can pretty much retouch and clone your photos in addition to several powerful image editing features.
Phoenix
Phoenix is available from aviary and it features advanced image editing features such as image blending, layer filtering and much more. However, the user interface is not as advanced as Gimp or Inkscape. All the same, for a free product, one cannot complain much.
Pixir
A sleek interface is the first thing you see when you open this online editor. You can choose from several modes and play around with several features such as blurring, liquid effects and layering. It also has a feature that allows you to capture images directly from webcams. This is a great product for quick image editing.
Blender
This product is great for 3D animation as well as fluid simulation, reflections, shading and skeletal kinetics. The interface has a wide range of effects and manipulation choices. This tool supports python scripts which gives it an edge over many other open source tools.
