Photoshop alternative with 32bit color depth

Hi,
i´ve been looking for an open source alternative for Photoshop.
It´s ok if it is not a single program. For exampel I read that Gimp + Krita can be good replacement for PS.
For animations I use the Blender compositor and it works very good but seems overkill for a still. For stills I currently render my image to passes as .hdr and then composite them in Photoshop which is just quicker for me than Blenders nodes and more flexible for some things.
I need to be able to work with and compose 32bit images. Even better if it can handle Multi Layered openEXR but .hdr support is fine as well.

I looked into Gimp 2.8 the other day and i haven´t really been able to find out if it can work with 32bit images. I haven´t found a button or anything where you can switch to 32bit (or even 16bit) mode. Some internet sources claim that Gimp can work with 32bit some other source (form 2012) claim that it will be able to work in 32bit soon.
So what is true?

Krita, the way I understand it is able to work with 32bit images. Now the question with Krita would be is it useful for compositing stills? Can I import a multi layered openEXR and composite away? It strikes me more as a painting programm for tablet artists.

Or are there other free, open source options?

Hi. Krita and Natron are OpenSource and support multilayer EXR. GIMP 2.10 (currently 2.9 development version) supports 32-bit, but I do not know if it can load EXR natively (currently does right through djv software)

Humm… I believe Gimp is automagically using 32-bit images? As long as you add the alpha channel, that is?

Or am I misunderstanding something?

Ok, interesting, thank you.
So 2.09 is the development version of 2.10. Ok. I´ll check that out.
I´ll look into natron but isn´t that more of a video compositor like AFX for example?
Is Krita usefull for compositing?

@Breagha: I mean 32bit floating point precision color depth. You probably mean a 8bit RGBA which is 4 times 8 bit. A 32bit RGBA has 4 times 32 bit. An 8 bit image has 256 degrees of brighness whereas a 32 bit image has next to infinite degrees of brighness. This is necessary if you want to composite your rendering out of the individual passes such as diffuse pass, direct glossy pass, indirect glossy pass and so on.

Ah, so I was misunderstanding ^^ - sowwy

May I ask why are you looking for an alternative? I mean some features could be replaced, but technically (overall features) there are no alternatives to PS and it has affordable pricing.

Anyway, PhotoLine could be the solution for you.

Gimp is not 32 bit, Krita is. I’ve heard from experienced Krita users that it can indeed replace Photoshop, but I’ve not gotten that deep into it myself.

If you enjoy working with nodes, you could try something like Nodewerk. http://nodewerk.com
I’m not sure if it’s 32 bit or not, though.

Natron is a compositing program, just like Nuke and After Effects, so yeah, it’s equivalent to using Blender as your photo editor.

I plan to test Krita, too, but to be honest I tested over 20-25 apps for replacing PS, both of them failed miserably.

I tested PS and it’s 32bit “workflow” and it also failed miserably. It can’t even open OpenEXR - LOL

the DEVELOPMENT branch of Gimp

Gimp 2.9.1 supports 32 bit and 16 bit images

It opens OpenEXR, just checked it again.

Photoline is what you seek. :yes:

  • full 32 bit per channel mode (and almost all filters will work in this mode)
  • Multi-layered OpenEXR files are supported: open and save. (Photoshop only supports single layered ones, and requires a commercial plugin [Pro-EXR] which costs MORE than a Photoline license!)
  • The latest beta also supports HDR file formats.
  • most internal processing is done at 32bit per channel
  • external file layers support: load up a 32bpc rendered background in Photoline as an external file layer. Then re-render the file later, and it updates automatically in your Photoline comp.
  • a layer stack that is arguably superior to Photoshop. Blend layers with an opacity range from -200(!) up to +200 for convenient blending. Layers can be cloned/instanced, and clones update in realtime when you edit the original (unlike the awkward Smart Objects in Photoshop)
  • the latest beta improved PSD Photoshop file support to a new level: even smart objects AND embedded Illustrator Smart objects are supported. And embedded Illustrator content can be edited directly in Photoline! Almost ALL PSD adjustment layers are now imported as non-destructive Photoline adjustment layers, and layer effects are converted as well.
  • full 16 bit per channel. Photoshop only does 15bpc in its so-called 16bpc mode, and trashes information from full 16bpc files. This does not happen in Photoline.

Photoline also works nicely together with other applications, and a round-tripping feature is available (for example, send your vector layer(s) to InkScape or bitmap layer to Krita, work on it, save, and Photoline autoimatically picks up on the change). Most external bitmap processing software can be setup as a “plugin”. For example, Gimp can be used as a plugin for Photoline.

Only 59 euros, and 29 euros to update. It will run on Mac, Windows, and Linux through WINE is supported by the devs (they even included Little CMS to accomodate colour management on Linux). And Photoline can be installed on a portable USB drive or stick. The installation file is a mere 20~30 MB!

Get the trial here: http://www.pl32.com/

I left Photoshop almost three years ago in favour of Photoline. Never regretted it.

Photoshop does not support multi-layered EXR files. ProEXR ($$ plugin) is required for that.

I checked it with Standard OpenEXR saved from Blender, it opened it. Multi-layered could differ perhaps.
No doubt Photoline is one of the most feature-full competitors to PS (I recommended it to the poster, too), but I found the GUI terrible.

[QUOTE=

I left Photoshop almost three years ago in favour of Photoline. Never regretted it.[/QUOTE]

mee too
Photoline is good, very good

No, not “perhaps”: Photoshop fails to load layered EXR files. I render multi-layered EXR files out of Blender, and they will not open correctly in Photoshop (only one layer is loaded). Photoshop’s built-in EXR support is a bit useless in that regard, unfortunately.

Which version of Photoline did you last test? The GUI in the latest version is very configurable: the GUI colours can be changed from dark to light (and any hue inbetween), the panels are completely configurable, and icons can be set to coloured or greyscale ones with or without shadows.

Of course, Photoline has its own conventions, just like Photoshop. I generally work much quicker in Photoline now than I used to in Photoshop (which I used since version 3!). Photoshop is just so buggy in 16bit per channel mode, and things like smart objects and layer masks are limiting factors as well. Layer masks cannot be referenced, for example. Nor can they be assigned adjustment layers. So limiting compared to Photoline.

Each app has its own perks and caveats, of course. There are no 3d features or video options in Photoline. But as an image editor it surprisingly outperforms photoshop in a number of areas.

Here is my setup for Photoline (and I imported a Blender rendered multi-layered EXR file, and made some quick changes). I like how Photoline displays the layer blend mode and opacity setting for each layer.


Thank you guys for all the suggestions and information.
I tried the developer version of Gimp 2.9. It doesn´t support openEXR but apparently there is a plugin for that. I couldn´t get it to work, though. Also, I read that it reduces the openEXR channels to 8bit images.
Otherwise I like Gimp. It´s like Photoshop with fewer functions but besides the lack of adjustment layers I´m happy with it´s feature list.
Sadly, without the plugin working it´s rather useless to me. At least on its own.

Next I´ll try PhotoLine.

Well, I migrated successfully from 3ds Max to Blender in the last 10 or so months and have been doing my first few commercial jobs completely without Max. This saves a bunch of money. I didn´t have to use Boujou either because of Blenders excelent motion tracker.
Now there are other programs, such as PS which wouldn´t save as much money to get rid of as Max but besides PS there is also other commercial prgrams and in the end perhaps even Windows I could get rid of.
So while a single one of these programs is not very expensive it does add up.
And in the end the money PS costs or the even higher costs for the whole suite are much better spent on the Blender Foundation or a nice vacation to Istanbul than on Adobe.

Thanks for the explanation.
Max is very price, I agree. I do most of my workflow in Blender for my actual projects, too, but still use Max for normal editing and some other stuff.

Photoline will do the job for you I think; for Image Editing with no Multi-Layered EXR support Serif PhotoPlus is a very handy and PS-like alternative (only opens single layer EXR) if I remember correctly.

What I miss from the competitors of PS is alpha-handling and support for 3D (Quixel).

Instead of Corel or Illustrator Serif DrawPlus is almost perfect.

Photoline seems great.
It opens openEXR files in 32 bit mode. It has trouble with buffer passes such as Depth, IndexOB, IndexMA and Mist. It also reads the normal pass wrong.
I can deal with that as the buffer passes are ususally useless anyway due to the lack of anti aliasing.

At first I had to giggle a bit because the tutorial manual looks like it´s right of a 90s “How to learn Geocities” course. But the sofware seems solid and the UI is what you expect from a modern Interface.
And it doesn´t lack Adustment Layers.
I haven´t tried painting textures yet but the toolset for doing so is there, so that shouldn´t be a problem.

Next is Krita.