Open Source creative tools
By Leo Gaggl
Since I am tired to constantly recite this list whenever one of these designer-type people tells me that they need Adobe’s Whatever Suite to do some basic task here is a summary that I can point them to.
Vector Graphics
Inkscape (http://inkscape.org/)
Xara Extreme (http://www.xaraxtreme.org/)
Raster Graphics
Gimp (http://www.gimp.org/)
Desktop Publishing
Scribus (http://www.scribus.net/)
Photo Editing
Gimp (see above)
Darktable (http://www.darktable.org/)
RawTherapee (http://www.rawtherapee.com/)
Luminance HDR (http://qtpfsgui.sourceforge.net/)
Layout Tools (DTP): Scribus (http://scribus.net/canvas/Scribus)
3D Modelling & Animation
Gimp (see above + plugins)
Blender (http://www.blender.org/)
Video Editing
CinelerraCV (http://cinelerra.org/)
OpenShot (http://www.openshot.org/)
Audio Editing
Audacity (http://audacity.sourceforge.net/)
Ardour (http://www.ardour.org/)
Before anybody thinks this is to start a flame-war – I don’t have a problem with a creative professional whose livelyhood depends on this work needing a professional package such as Adobe Creative Suite. I do however have a problem when some graduate or work-experience kid dabbling in graphics tells me he can not do this with anything else. Hopefully this list helps to open some minds ….