LightZone is a free alternative to Lightroom

[Stevenmarc]

Windows/Mac/Linux: Adobe Lightroom might be the professional photographer's photo management tool of choice, but you can save $149 and download free and open source LightZone instead.

The program lets you quickly manipulate a batch of photos, with great effects and styles and finely adjustable tools. Instead of layers (a la Adobe), color masks, and masks, LightZone divides an image into 16 "zones". Each zone varies in brightness from the ones next to them by 50%, and you can easily manipulate the zones to change brightness and contrast. You can also change parts of an image by drawing a vector shape.

http://lifehacker.com/lightzone-is-a-free-awesome-photo-editor-and-alternati-1445640040?utm_campaign=socialflow_lifehacker_twitter&utm_source=lifehacker_twitter&utm_medium=socialflow

Ok I haven't downloaded yet and because it hit Lifehacker, the website is behaving a bit persnickety, I'll wait a bit but it might be worth a try.

[alfredo]

1. I got to the site, but it is overrun.

[Stevenmarc]

2. I got past the registration

But haven't downloaded it yet, something for tomorrow's to do list.

Although I'm an Adobe person I do keep Gimp on my netbook and hopefully this will also work well on it.

[Stevenmarc]

3. And while you're waiting

Check YouTube, there are a few good tutorials and I'm pretty impressed with it even more so at the price

[alfredo]

4. I've read a few, and figured out some stuff from playing.

[alfredo]

5. After playing with it, I find it is better suited for black and white. Maybe once I get used to it,

color techniques will come to me. Maybe once I get the hang of Zones, I can get the rich colors I like. It might be a combo of working with Zones and saturation.

[Stevenmarc]

6. Looks interesting

Downloaded it and played for 5 min but will play a bit more later, I'm in the middle of a video project that's inches away from deadline.

[alfredo]

7. Deadline is a four letter word. So happy I am retired.

GIMP is still my first choice for color and the wide range of plugins.