Free Online Image Editors

We normally recommend the desktop application Picasa (free download) for managing all of your photos, but a number of new online photo editors are becoming available that are very powerful, easy to use, and free. These can be handy for quick image editing on the go, and can even work with the images that you already have online. Here are two services that I am impressed with:

Piknic

The Picnik sign-up screen

It’s easy to sign up and get started, and there’s even some demo photos to play with before you get an account. Once you sign in, you can import photos from your PC, or even from several online photo services like Picasa Web Albums and Flickr.

The Picnik photo editing window

The actual editor is easy to use. The interface isn’t cluttered, but there are many powerful options. Cropping, for example, is as easy as drawing a box across the screen, and there are options for constraining the aspect to match a certain photo sizes (3×5, 5×7, etc.)

Once you’re done, Picnik has options to save the photos to your PC, send via e-mail, or post back to your favorite online photo service.

Adobe Photoshop Express

The Photoshop Express image editing screen

Adobe’s new online photo editing service has most of the same options; you can grab images, edit them, and then save them back to your PC or online service.

There are significant differences, though. Photoshop Express has a slicker look, and seems to cater to more advanced users. Photoshop Express lets you store your photos in your own section of their site (yourname.photoshop.com) and display them to others in galleries.

Power users will probably prefer Photoshop Express’ layout, with lots of options available, but casual users may find the simplified layout of Piknic more appealing. Piknic also seems a bit snappier when loading and making edits. I recommend to try them both out. Leave a comment here to let us know what you think!