Looking for the best photo editing software? Here we are to provide you with a detailed tutorial for Photo editors that you must use. With the popularity of social media such as Instagram and Facebook, everyone is looking for the perfect shot, but it is impossible without a good photo editing tool.
Photo Editing Software truly improvised your photography to the next level and make everyone stunned. Looking for the same expression from your friends, or family members? Stay tuned and check out our top picks. It may be noted that the recommended lists of software are not just for personal use but also for professional use.
Now to meet the user’s requirement, many photo editing software comes with tons of presets so that you can instantly put effects along with manual editing. But still, if you like manual editing, you don’t require any professional course.
10 Best Photo Editing Software
1. Skylum Luminar
From the first look on the official website of Skylum Luminar, you will love this! It shows you the slider to compare before and after on its website, where you can see the actual difference. On the same side, it is as easy to work with as you slide to compare. It provides you with tons of presets along with manual customization. Another best thing is that Luminar keeps updating to the latest version to fix issues regularly.
Either for personal use or professional, Skylum Luminar would be the top choice of many experts and individuals. It’s not just photography software but a complete suite to manage your photo. You can set up your gallery without navigating to your system’s Photos.
Skylum Luminar Features
1. Accent AI: Accent AI understands human adjustments and allows itself to make dozen of investments on its own for realistic results. As it comes with human-aware technology, AI automatically makes changes.
2. AI Sky Enhancer: Sky is something that differentiates between the perfect photo you have clicked. If you are really well with adjusting the Sky lightening then it’s good otherwise AI Sky enhancer does it for you instantly. You can give a more dramatic look whether it is sunrise or sunset. You can manually add sun rays to make a perfect shot.
3. Erase unwanted objects: Many pictures clicked have unwanted objects or unknown people around you. With erase tool, you can clean them out without any traces as it looks pretty natural after removing them.
4. Sharpening & detail tools: If you have some blur pictures or older pictures, sharpening and detailing tools to give it clarity more than you expect. If something is to make noticed, use the Detail Enhancer filter.
5. Access to Library: With the latest release of Luminar, you now no longer require to shuffle between your device gallery to the Luminar editor. With one click, you can access all your photos on the Luminar application and you can manage them better from a single place. You can create folders according to your preferences.
There are many other advanced features that you can enjoy with Skylum Luminar. The best thing is, that Luminar also gives you free video tutorials for individual filters to use in the right way with less time.
Plans from Skylum Luminar
Skylum Luminar comes with a single plan or a bundle with Aurora HDR software. It also offers you a free 14-day trial period.
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2. Adobe Photoshop
Every expert has this or worked with this. Adobe Photoshop is not a new name in the photography industry; in fact, the starting industry for Photography tools. The reason for keeping this in second place is its many advanced features that require professional knowledge. if you have little or no knowledge of photography software, then we do not recommend it to you.
If you are already using any other photography software, then learning Adobe Photoshop becomes easy. You can create impossible things possible with Adobe Photoshop.
Have you seen any illusion in the photograph? This all could be possible with Adobe Photoshop. You can do anything with your photograph if you have Adobe Photoshop and complete professional knowledge on how to make effects.
Adobe Photoshop Features
1. Create Illustrations: Make complex illustrations with Adobe photoshop, which are almost impossible to imagine. It provides you a graphic design software through which you can transform multiple pictures into one.
2. 3D Artwork: Whether you work in games, films, architecture, or design, Adobe provides you with a Substance application with which you can customize the texturing of your 3D photograph.
3. Mobile application: Along with having the PC or Mac application, Adobe PhotoShop comes with mobile applications for both iOS and Android devices. You can just do it on a smartphone for instant editing of the picture to upload on social sites.
4. Real-time painting: You can create a real-time painting that is all in perfectly symmetrical patterns. You can use a pencil, paintbrush, and markers to make a natural feel to the photograph.
5. Dedicated workspace: Adobe Photoshop has an inbuilt Content-Aware fill feature with which you can make changes on a photo with the exact color match without any flaws in the picture.
Adobe Photoshop is full of features and is recommended for professional editors.
Plans from Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Photoshop is expensive and comes with a flexible range from Individual to Business levels. There is also an option to get Lightroom included with this pack. It comes with a 7-day free trial period absolutely free.
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3. Corel PaintShop Pro
PaintShop Pro is another high-rated photography and graphic design software that brings fundamental changes to your photograph. Turning your visuals into reality is never as easy as this fantastic software provides. With progressive, innovative technology makes the picture genuinely original. You can create an unexpected design on your current photograph to amaze everyone. It also supports the new RAW camera.
Corel PaintShop has many advanced features. With the latest release of the newer version, the all-new improved interface lets users navigate to all filters with ease. Corel PaintShop is for you whether you are a beginner or an expert. It also provides a free guide and tutorials for working with advanced filters.
Corel PaintShop Pro Features
1. Smart Clone: Something irritating in your photo? Use intelligent cloning to remove them from the picture and give it a natural look. You can also merge images in-between for integrating multiple pictures.
2. Refine Brush: With extreme precision and accuracy, the Refine brush is added to mark the specific area and refine them with different colors and illustrations.
3. Creative content: PaintShop provides you with different brushes, color patterns, radiance, and other creative content to enhance the photography experience. You can download the latest patterns and add them to your photo.
4. Layers capability: It replicates the style settings from one layer to another.
5. DoF precision: For enhanced 4K support, this provides fantastic precision to every minor detail on your picture.
Plans from Corel PaintShop Pro
PaintShop allows users to try it for free and comes with premium plans. Currently, it offers you PaintShop Pro and PaintShop Ultimate plans.
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4. ACDSee Photo Studio Ultimate
Whether it is RAW editing, Layer editing, all can be handled with ACDSee Photo Studio Ultimate. It has an intuitive User Interface, which provides easy handling of all the photography effects. ACDSee gives you a Video tutorial resource center that gives you every detail on the working of ACDsee Photo Studio.
Along with editing your picture, you can also manage them from the same platform. You can find, sort, move, and organize right from the ACDSee application. You can add visual tags or customizable color labels to recognize photos quickly.
You can also add the geographical location to every photo to have the best map view when you see your pictures after a few years.
ACDSee Photo Studio Ultimate Features
1. Black & White mode: The era of having black & white photographs is gone, but the trend is still there. Not just having the black and white color on the picture. The filter gives you an advanced option to increase or decrease the contrast of each color.
2. Luminosity selection: Adjust your image according to the luminosity lever for better pixel impact.
3. RAW Editing: The RAW image is seen by the camera’s sensor. Photo Studio Ultimate’s built-in support for over 500 camera models, and you can quickly transform pictures using exposure, contrast, color, repair, sharpening, and other detail-based tools.
4. Layer Editing: The main reason for layer editing is that you can edit the picture layer by layer and reverse the layer anytime.
Plans from ACDSee Photo Studio
ACDSee Photo Studio has great saving plans. You can pick ACDSee Home Pack, ACDSee Photo Studio Ultimate, Professional, Standard, and for Mac licenses.
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5. Capture One Pro
Capture One Pro is a professional photography software with various advanced features. You can have complete control over organizing, color grading, and layer editing. The best thing is you can purchase the license with specific camera models.
With its fantastic platform, you have complete control of the image and workflow. Let us quickly have a quick review on this.
Capture One Pro
1. Accuracies in color: Now you have a color meter to choose the specific background and the space to work with more accurate colors. An exact color metric will soon not differentiate an original from an editable image.
2. Fast import/ export: Making asset management simple, fast, and effective. It allows you to have all your pictures in one place on its library, so you need not require to transfer images for editing purposes manually.
3. Color editing with precision: Capture One is designed to handle color exceptionally. It provides a high value of precision to every detail of your photograph.
4. Tethered capture: Tethered capture allows you to connect your camera to your computer to view digital images instantly. This is best where speed and accuracy matter.
Plans from Capture One Pro
Capture One Pro comes with flexible plans. It has different style packs, and the pricing is accordingly. Other plans are from Capture One Pro for Sony Cameras and Fujifilm.
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6. Skylum Aurora HDR
Aurora HDR is the most advanced HDR photo editor from Skylum. As the name defines HDR, it is mainly for HDR photography. The best thing is, along with the standalone application, it works as extensions and plugins to Lightroom, Photoshop, and Apple Photos. It has about 100+ unique outlook that instantly improves your photo from RAW to excellent editing.
Recommended: 5 Best HDR Software for Mac/ Windows
Skylum Aurora HDR is so designed as it is easy to work with from beginners to the professional level. It has detailed video tutorials for every filter you require in HDR photography.
Features of Aurora HDR
It is full of advanced features from basic to advanced levels.
1. Quantum HDR engine: Aurora HDR is driven by Artificial Intelligence which automatically senses the image and draws the effects by counting every tiny portion of the image. Have different brackets of images? use Tone-mapping technology for the best outcome.
2. HDR Smart structure: You can make in-depth effects free from artificial looks with the intelligent structure. You no longer need to worry about noisy artifacts or chromatic aberration.
3. Selective editing: Multiple editing options are available such as a layer, brushers, and masking.
4. Built-in sharing support: Aurora HDR has in-built sharing options for different photo communities and other social sites. You no need to transfer photos from the application to your computer anymore.
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Plans from Aurora HDR
The best saving available for the bundle option includes Luminar + Aurora HDR. You can also purchase a single Aurora HDR license. There is also a great deal with a unique promotional code. Check the deal in the below box.
7. Photomatix Pro
HDRsoft Photomatix Pro is another HDR software that has a fantastic picture results. It is also best known for Real Estate photography, whether interior or exterior. Without any lighting effects, you can see the actual color toning of every object in the image.
This is a professional photography software but easy to navigate to all its features. Thus, recommended for every level of user. It also provides user manuals and video tutorials to provide in-depth detail of every feature to make your picture perfect.
Features of Photomatix Pro
1. Batch Processing: This is basically to edit multiple images in one go. Suppose you have different resolution images, and you can make a perfect single image with batch processing. This saves a lot of time.
2. Selective Ghost Removal: Remove anything from the image intelligently if nothing looks relevant to your image. Just mark the object, automatically removing them with a single click.
3. Plugin support for Adobe Lightroom: Photomatix Pro provides you with a plugin that supports Adobe Lightroom.
4. Photomatix Real Estate Camera: Get an app on your iPhone and edit it. For quick editing and upload, this is quite helpful.
Plans from Photomatix Pro
There are many different plans ranging from individual to multi-user licenses. There is also bundle offers that include all individual plans. You can also get a special discount with the coupon code it offers. Check the below box for more details.
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8. Affinity Photo
Affinity Photo is special software that consists of all features you have seen on the above photography tools. This fully loaded photography works with Windows, macOS, and iOS devices. It is quick to work with Hugh resolution images, even with 100+ MP photographs, and all this can be done in real-time.
Features from Affinity Photo
1. Fine-tuned adjustments: With its most advanced features you can make corrections and enhance the image. You can adjust your picture according to what you would like to make them appear.
2. Flawless retouching: Make quick corrections to your image. It provides you with Smooth & retouch skin effects, Dodge & burn removals, patch removals, and much more. Remove unwanted things quickly.
3. Amazing Filter layers: You can mask and reorder effects like blurs, lighting, and distortions and adjust the picture accordingly.
4. Full Raw development: Click a RAW picture and adjust whatever you want. Adjust exposure, black point, white balance, and much more.
Plans from Affinity Photo
Affinity Photo is compatible with Windows, macOS, and iPad. It also provides a free trial period to try before you buy.
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9. DxO PhotoLab
DxO PhotoLab is a professional photo editing software that gives stunning results with its advanced processing and correction tools. It has a wide range of features to make your workflow the best.
DxO PhotoLab Features
1. Optical corrections: It has optical correction modules with which you can correct any flaws and distortions in your image.
2. Automatic adjustments: It has many advanced automatic modes with which it adjusts pictures on its own. You can also enjoy the manual methods for more details.
3. DENOISE technology: Advanced Denoise technology helps reduce noise in the picture, mostly occurring at night. Whatever the ISO range, you can have the best picture every time.
4. Intuitive workflow: It has Users friendly interface having all the features right in front of you. All you access from editing to sharing on social media from a single dashboard.
DxO PhotoLab Plans
DxO PhotoLab comes with a one-time purchase and also offers free 30-day trial. DxO PhotoLab is compatible with both macOS and Windows OS.
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10. ON1 Photo RAW
ON1 Photo RAW is the last recommendation on the list of top 10 photo editors. It also comes with the latest advanced features powered by Artificial Intelligence. The users have an excellent review on this, and for both professional and beginners level, ON1 Photo RAW works excellently.
Features of ON1 Photo RAW
1. Effects: There are hundreds of presets from every category, such as architecture, cinematic, color grading, B&W filming, weddings, sports, HDR looks, and many more.
2. HDR: Amazing tone mapping with Auto alignment with auto deghosting, Preview ghosting areas.
3. Panorama Stitching: Combine multiple pictures to set a seamless panorama view. You can add vertical and horizontal stitching, whatever you require.
4. Development tools: Endless development tools are available such as exposure, contrasts, shadows, highlights, skin retouching, split tone, lens corrections, glow, curves, and much more.
5. Adjustments & maskings: With adjustable gradients, color painting, and adjusting brushes, you can reduce artifacts.
Plans from ON1 Photo RAW
Get a free trial for 30-days or grab the premium paid version. It comes with a one-time purchase and a yearly subscription. With the release of the latest version, you can update anytime.
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You must try this list of the 10 best photo editing software. But if you are still confused about the above, let us clarify this more. If you are looking for easy, professional, quality results, then Luminar from Skylum is our top choice. Otherwise, if you are looking for an HDR category, then definitely Skylum Aurora HDR and HDRsoft Photomatix must be the best deal.
I hope you find this article informative and successfully choose the best photography software for you. Comment below if you have suggestions for our readers in picking out the best.
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