Free Software Thread - Office And Image Software, Etc.

And for free image processing, you can look at Gimp. The interface is a little different from Corel and Adobe, and it doesn't have the high bit depth (HDR) processing capabilities of a full version of Photoshop. It is very good for most everyday image processing needs - cropping, removing lens distortion, skewing and perspective correction, sharpening, resizing, color correcting, despeckling, etc. And it's free open source software with free open source filters and add-ons that you can use to customize your install.

You can find it here:
http://www.gimp.org/downloads/

Anyone else looking for freeware or have a find to share?

Image J is the newest version of NIH image. This is imaging software developed by the National Institutes of Health for people doing biomedical imaging and image analysis. Even people working with microscopes and X-ray diffractometers need to make their pictures printable and details viewable after they crunch them into numbers for data. You'll find some of the features you need for image processing in general, some that you probably won't ever need, and some fun math-y filters to play with.

Runs on Windows, Mac and Linux
http://rsb.info.nih.gov/ij/download.html

What a great thread. Thank you

Free filters: http://www.thepluginsite.com/products/harrysfilters/

Free brushes: http://myphotoshopbrushes.com/

Thanks for the links Louise, and thanks Abby for bumping

Great thread theme, Regina! My most trusted 'go to' sites for Freeware -

http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/

http://www.snapfiles.com/freeware/

I've used these sites for years (I check GOTD every morning), and both sites are well-known and highly respected for sharing virus-free applications. However, as always, scan software before installing. Also remember to check system requirements and read any reviews, to see if the software will work for your system.

When you're bored with work, try GameGiveawayOfTheDay, which offers one or two free games per week -

http://game.giveawayoftheday.com/

For both GOTD sites, user reviews and votes are found on the download pages. Unless otherwise noted, software must be downloaded and installed on the day it's offered.

Thanks Wendy, those look like fun. What kind of software do they usually feature?

A by, I remember you had a whole lot of information posted on social sharing helper apps - Klout, dashboards for feeds etc. Care to repost a few links (or maybe we can find that thread and post the link?)

Klout has changed a lot. Now they offer buffer-like scheduling of shares as well as scores and rewards.

They each offer a wide variety of software: image creating/editing, text/html editors, video viewing/authoring/editing, system utilities, organization and productivity tools, etc. . . . you name it!

Please remember when downloading free programmes that many work on a shopping programme basis now.

This means they make money by your adding on their extra programme which then adds shopping browser bar, or links and ads to pages.

The way to stop this is to always go for the custom install.

UNTICK anything that is not the programme you have downloaded. You do not HAVE to install everything to run the programme.

So look for what you are installing and UNTICK all other programmes, normally anti virus programmes, shopping addons etc

This programmes will add lots of extras to your computer you do not need. If you UNTICK whilst installing you will just get the free programme you are asking for

Great point, Abbie!

Also, if you find yourself installing programs but not using them, remember to do regular housekeeping on your system. No need to fill your hard drives with stuff you're not interested in using.

MyPaint. http://mypaint.intilinux.com/

Don't look at the name, it's a nice paint program with great brushes. Works great on weak computers!

Krita. https://krita.org/
Started as a photoshop killer but has been evolving as a great painting and drawing program. Is also available at Steam as pay version to pay the developers for an even better Krita.

Both programs are free (open source) and work great on Linux, on Windows I have never tested them. Thank the Linux open source world to bring Gimp, MyPaint, Krita, etc, etc to the Windows world. Would be nice if Windows developers would return the favor to Linux.

Forgot to mention Blender 3D: http://www.blender.org/

Make amazing images, animations, movies, etc. Open source and available for all operating systems. Has a very strong Linux heart.

Inkscape: https://inkscape.org/en/

How can I forget Inkscape?
According to the Inkscape site:
Inkscape is a professional vector graphics editor for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux. It's free and open source.

Painting with Gimp:

Gimp and Open Office are completely free if you downlod them from the open source organizations that created them. No sneaky search bars, antivirus that you don't need, adware, etc.
These are open source programs that operate off donations of mo ey and programming expertise, similar to Wikipedia.

However, there are a number of other sites that offer their own free download distributions of the same software. These unofficial sites often DO have search bars, adware, and other junk snuck into the install.

So, use the links from the open source orgs for open sourced freeware. For other software, be careful to read before you click.

NIH image and Jimage were developed using US tax dollars. They are also completely free from the NIH site. There are probably "enterprising" persons offering unofficial free downloads of the same software - with adware and malware added.

Good morning all (thogh a bit belated for Europe, Asia, Africa, and Oceana)
Any other finds guys?

Hi Jan,
I appreciate your open sourced links and comments about open source software on Linux versus Windows platforms. From the programmers and software developers in my own social circle, it seems that the creative socially-minded ones just gravitate towards Linux. And then they share outward. The Windows community is a different bunch of people with different motivations.

Good morning! 5.30 am Tues here.......Great thread!....Thank You !