I’ll discuss these software companies in order of least to most used. Affinity isn’t a recent editing software company. They started in 1987 and originally created software for Windows. In 2014 they broke off from Microsoft and started creating their own software starting with Affinity Designer. This was then followed by Affinity Photo, and their recently released, June 2019, Affinity Publisher. Affinity Designer is their vector graphics editor used for projects such as business logos. Next is Affinity Photo which is their raster image editor. This software can be used for both photo editing as well as creating digital art. Finally, Affinity Publisher is for creating digital documents for the intent of printing. This includes posters, brochures, and business cards.

Each of these programs costs a one-time payment of $50.00 USD. Depending on your situation this might be a bit much upfront but it’s the cheaper of the two in the long run. All three programs support a large variety of file formats that can be imported for use, including Adobe file formats. This makes it a great tool if working with someone who prefers to use Adobe over Affinity products. I’ve used these programs personally and have found it has a learning curve. I was first introduced to Adobe products so the first thing I had to do was figure out what was the same, and what was different. Overall, the layout is fairly similar with a few minor differences when it comes to layout presets. The biggest difference that I noticed was the tools. Some tools were the same, others were renamed but shared the same purpose, and a few, such as their Persona’s, were only in Affinity. Overall Affinity has great products for a more consumer-friendly price tag.

Now it’s time to discuss the most recognized and the most used editing software company in the market, Adobe. Adobe opened in 1982 and slowly built their table of Adobe elements. They provide over 50 different programs so for the same of reading I will only discuss the most relevant to graphic design. These products include, but are not limited to, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe InDesign, Adobe After Effects, Adobe Premiere, and Adobe Audition.

The pricing for these programs can get complicated so I’d highly suggest following the Adobe link at the beginning of the post for more accurate details. Through Adobe you have two options, either get the programs individually or get them in bundles. You might be able to find a copy of their older versions for a one-time payment but if you want their current and supported versions you have to pay a subscription to use them. For example, if you planned on only using Adobe Photoshop it would cost $20.99 USD a month for the annual plan, or $31.49 USD if you only intended to use it a few months within the year where you only pay for the month you want to use it. They also offer smaller bundles created for specific purposes, such as graphic design, or they have the Adobe Creative Cloud which has all of their software included. This option costs $39.99 a month for the annual plan, or $79.49 if you want to pay for a month.

Now that we’re past probably most peoples cons we can get to the pros. The reason why Adobe has the creative cloud is due to the fact that all of your files can be saved into the cloud. The largest benefit for this is the fact that files from one program can be imported and edited by another program. Adobe Illustrator is used for vector graphics, Adobe Photoshop for raster images, Adobe InDesign for printable files, Adobe After Effects for video special effects, Adobe Premiere for video editing, and Adobe Audition for audio editing. Files creating from Adobe Audition or Adobe After Effects can be imported into Adobe Premiere to make final edits before finishing any video or audio projects. This has been very helpful for me when working on class assignments that needed specific edits made that might not have been available in the program I used to begin the project. Adobe is the best editing software company in the market but may not be for everyone due to their subscriptions.

So far these programs have only been able to perform one type of editing. With my final recommendation you can kill two birds with one stone. My last recommendation is GIMP, which stand for GNU Image Manipulation Program. Gimp has the capabilities of both editing photos, as well as either editing or developing raster images. Meaning if you want to edit your photos but want a program that doesn’t require an internet connection that GIMP is your tool. If you want to create digital art but don’t want to spend money on digital art programs, then GIMP is your tool as well. Although there was a bit of a learning curve, GIMP is my go to program when I need to create a rasterized image.

The pros for this program is it’s free to use, allows for both editing photos and creating raster images, it has a decent selection of brushes, and it can open several different file formats such as Adobe Photoshop (psd). The cons for the program is the tools have a learning curve, some brushes seem unnecessary, and you have to know the names of the fonts you want to use. Overall whether you need to edit photos or want to create digital art, I’d highly recommend trying GIMP.