Bookstagram 101: 7 Desktop Photo Editing Apps

Safety Note on Flash

Initially, I meant to put together a post outlining ten desktop editing options. This would have been a logical follow-up to my post on ten mobile photo editing apps. I trawled the App Store every other week for new apps, considered recommendations from photographers and read posts from bloggers across various niches.

PicMonkey, Canva and Pixlr seem to be favourites among the web-based apps. Unfortunately, I didn’t get to test those claims for PicMonkey and Pixlr. I also had to give up my discovery of Befunky for one simple reason: they run on Flash. I uninstalled it a long time ago due to the never-ending security issues.

Flash Player suffers from gaping holes that have made it possible to hijack or crash computers. Hackers can exploit Flash and install malware on computers, or worse, ransomware. This is why I cannot recommend any of the web-based photo editing tools that rely on the Flash Player. Run for the hills, friends.

My Recommendations

Culling the photo editing tools that run on Flash and the ones that weren’t all that useful left me with few great options. Thankfully, they each have their strengths and range from paid to free.

1. Adobe Photoshop

Price: US$9.99/month (minimum, depending on plan)

Platform(s): Mac OS + Windows

There is a reason photoshoppping has become synonymous to photo editing. Photoshop is one of the best desktop editing apps out there. It also is a lot more affordable today than it was ten years ago. In the past you had to shell out hundreds of dollars for Photoshop alone. The entire Adobe Creative Suite set customers back by a 4-digit sum. Monthly plans make it easier to work it into your budget and the student plan means Adobe’s programs can cost less than monthly mobile phone bills.

I favour Photoshop for the control it offers. Editing is non-destructive and done in layers. This means that the photo is the base layer and each edit forms a new layer on top. When you’re done editing, but then decide your image is still too dark, you only need to adjust the layer you specifically applied for brightness. If you understand what I just said, chances are, you’re already using Photoshop. If you didn’t understand, you’ll recognize that there is a learning curve but I guarantee that it is worth the effort and money.

2. Adobe Bridge with Camera Raw Plugin

Price: Bridge is free but plugin requires Photoshop (US$9.99/month minimum, depending on plan)

Platform(s): Mac OS + Windows

Let’s say you do have Photoshop but learning the ropes is a little daunting or you don’t have time to figure things out. Sticking to Bridge simplifies things a great deal. Bridge is actually a file management tool. That’s what I use to organise my photos. With the Camera Raw plugin, jumping from one photo to the next, or even bulk editing is a breeze.

You have your basic editing functions, such as white balance, exposure, contrast, and such. For more precise exposure adjustments, there’s the tone curve too. Perspectives and blemishes can be corrected without much hassle. As with editing in Photoshop, the original image remains intact, so you can apply as many different styles of edits as you please.

3. Adobe Lightroom

Price: US$9.99/month (minimum, depending on plan)

Platform(s): Mac OS + Windows

I’ve become so comfortable with my Bridge and Photoshop combination, that Lightroom has kind of fallen off my laptop’s grid. I do have it and I plan to at least try it out some time soon. My sister uses it and wouldn’t have it any other way. It offers the same editing functions as the Camera Raw plugin in Bridge and more. In simplistic terms, it’s situated between Camera Raw and Photoshop. You can manage your photo library in Lightroom and edit the majority of your bookstagram photos without ever opening Photoshop.

4. GIMP

Price: free

Platform(s): Mac OS + Windows + Linux + others

Not everyone can or wants to spend money on software, though. GIMP carries a lot of Photoshop’s benefits. Most importantly, it’s free. While its functions are pared down compared to Photoshop, it is packed with most of the features a bookstagrammer would need and then some.

5. PhotoScape

Price: free (paid upgrade available for Mac OS)

Platform(s): Mac OS + Windows

PhotoScape is a photo editing software, well-tailored to Instagrammers. It boasts basic editing functions, offers a variety of filters, frames for collages and a text function. Anyone who has edited photos on mobile apps will feel right at home. You can also easily navigate folders within the app itself to pick out photos to edit, individually or in a batch. Oh and it even allows you to create GIFs.

6. Fotor

Price: free (paid upgrade available)

Platform(s): Mac OS + Windows

Similar to PhotoScape, photos can be edited individually or in batches. There’s a collage feature and of course, the basic editor which also includes various filters. You can add text, which is handy for quick watermarking. One thing that Fotor has that PhotoScape doesn’t is a histogram. If you know how to read it, it’s very helpful for adjusting proper exposures. Although Fotor is available for mobile devices, it can’t sync across platforms.

Sidenote: Fotor is also web-based but runs on Flash, so I don’t recommend that option.

7. Canva

Price: free (paid upgrade available)

Platform(s): web-based

Canva is a graphic design rather than photo editing software but it’s worth considering. It’s very well suited for social media and blogging. If you’re hosting a giveaway, read-a-thon, photo challenge, or need post headers, you can put together elegant graphics. Before importing a photo, I suggest editing it in another app. Applying filters to images, though, is pretty versatile as beyond intensity, you can also fine tune tint, cross-processing strength and more. What I particularly like about Canva is that everything you do is saved in your account. This means you can start editing on your desktop, then continue in-app on your phone.

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What are your favourite photo editing tools?