Retouch Your Old Scanned Photos with Free Software

In a time where every penny counts, money should be saved whenever possible. If you are an amateur photographer that wants to retouch, organize or share photos, you shouldn’t pay hundreds of dollars in photo editing software that will generally have more capabilities than you actually need. So, whether you are looking to retouch those old scanned photos or just organize your digital memories, but still keep your pocket full, you might want to consider a free software program. Here are my top 3 recommendations for retouching your old scanned photos:

1. GIMP, also known as “the poor man’s Photoshop,” is packed with advanced features that will help you retouch and/or manipulate images just as Photoshop would. This is a great option for those with more experience in photo editing that need more complex tools. Another great advantage of GIMP is the fact that it’s an open source project, meaning it is constantly being updated with new features by generous programmers.

2. Paint.net is my personal favorite. It has all the main features of GIMP such as magic wand, clone and heal, but with a simpler interface. If you are just looking for “auto-everything” to retouch images, this might be a little overkill. However, if you are looking for rich-featured software with basic experience in photo editing this might be a good one to try out.

3.  Picasa, from Google, is perfect for those with no editing experience that love to share photos. With features like one button sync to Google photos, you can share photos in a snap. Picasa does a good job at doing minor touch-ups, such as auto-contrast, crop/rotate, and red eye removal. Some features that also caught my attention were, “Timeline” which organizes all your old scanned photos by month and year; and collage, which lets you pick a group of photos and create a collage in a matter of seconds. 

Pick which one you think might fit your needs and start editing. Get creative and create digital scrapbooks to share with family and friends for generations to come. You got nothing to lose and lot to share!

Tags: old photos, scanned photos

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 1st, 2009 at 9:00 am and is filed under Photo Scanning. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.