Pixelmator is one of the best tools for editing photos on Mac. The best thing about Pixelmator is that it packs a lot of features and it makes handling with the photos easy. Not to forget, its polished interface looks nice too.
Pixelmator recently released Pixelmator 3.2 which features some powerful editing options like Repair tool, Layer locking and 16-bit per channel support. While Pixelmator 3.0 FX was focused on support for OS X Mavericks and a few tools, Pixelmator 3.1 came with Mac Pro support and layer style improvements, the latest update, that is Pixelmator 3.2 came with photo editing improvements, new tools and user interface improvements, so making it a significant update. Let’s have a look at all the new features and some of the old features which are improved in the new update.
Pixelmator now comes with All new Repair-tool, which lets you deal with unwanted objects in photos. You can use the tool to remove unwanted objects from the photo, and it quite works flawlessly in Pixelmator. You just need to select the Repair tool(having band-aid icon) from the Tools bar and select the type of Repair, which can be Quick, Standard or Advanced.
Once you select the type of Repair, you just need to select the object in the photo which you want to remove and it will automatically remove the object. Though it worked finely for most of the time for me, it needs some more work as it leaves some patches of the object even after its removal. Above is quick demonstration of the Repair tool.
Changing the diameter size in Pixelmator 3.2 now gives a very nice effect. When you drag left or right through the diameter slider, it gives a very nice effect. The New Layer locking feature allows users to lock specific layers. This comes in handy if users want to edit other layers without affecting a specific layer.
Pixelmator comes with an Effect Browser Window which includes options for controlling Color Adjustments, Blur, Sharpness , etc. When you hover over an effect, the position of the cursor on the effect block shows the strength of that effect, so if you take the mouse at the center of an effect and double-click, it will apply that effect with 50% strength. This is the first time I am seeing something like this and it is very interesting and nice. You can apply a lot of effects from the Effect Browser. When you double-click on any effect, it opens an effect option window through which you can control the strength of the effect and adjust the effect to your desire.
With Pixelmator 3.2, you can create a shape from selection. Apart from all these additions, the update also brings performance improvements and photo handling.
Pixelmator 3.2 is available for $29.99 on Mac App Store and is free for existing users.