Krita 1.6 — State of the Art

brendan0powers writes to tell us Linux.com is reporting that while Krita 1.6 may have been released with the rest of the KOffice suite this week it is anything but a run-of-the-mill piece of productivity software. Krita is a 'fully-loaded raster graphics workhorse' definitely capable of standing up to most anything else available. Linux.com and Slashdot are both owned by OSTG.

Huh?

[Overzeetop]

Okay, so I've never heard of it. Not unusual - there are lots of killer apps out there I've never heard of. But, um, how does it stack up to the other "'fully-loaded raster graphics workhorse'" programs out there. More importantly, what are those others. ATTFA, MS Office Picture Manager isn't one. Okay. So it must be more like...um...anything in the article...no.

Okay, so where does it fit in the Photoshop, PaintShopPro, GIMP arena? Is it simpler, easier? More powerful (it is a fully loaded workhorse, after all)?

Maybe this is just a "hey - all you guys with the old Krita - there's a new .x version now". Which is fine, but really front page news?

So, is this really sliced bread, or just a little bump in the feature set of KOffice?

what about RAW photo formats?

[Anonymous Coward]

What options are there to edit RAW photo files under Linux? Does Krita handle those format(s)? It doesn't seem to....what does?

Impressive

[TheViewFromTheGround]

I've been poking around with Krita 1.6, and I'm impressed. The Krita developers seem to have a much better understanding of how a simple-yet-effective FLOSS raster graphics app should work and look like. The GIMP has always seemed too complex for the casual user, but too shaggy and feature-poor for the serious graphics person.

The Krita developers are doing a laudable effort to grow their application carefully and intentionally, just like the Scribus has done, adding high priority features and implementing them well (Krita's new layer-groups implementation worked very well for me without getting in the way).

If it continues this way, Krita is likely to grab significant mindshare from the GIMP.

How the heck do I load a jpg?

[thule]

I must be a complete idiot when it comes to KDE apps. I normally use Gnome, but I thought I'd try Krita out. I did a 'yum install koffice-krita' and it installed normally. I tried to load up a photograph in Krita, but I could not figure out how to do it. I tried 'krita somepic.jpg' and that didn't work. I tried a File->Open and that didn't work. Can someone that is a KDE expert tell me how to use a KDE app?

Re:How the heck do I load a jpg?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well at work, I am force to use fedora, and I also wanted to use krita, and I also couldn't find how to save or load png/tiff/jpeg (and I am a krita developers !), the simple answers is that they have hidden the filters in koffice-filters (an optional dependency, how can you consider jpeg/png/tiff to be optional ?), but sadly koffice-filters depends on other koffice application, so if you wanted krita only, you are screwed :)

And as a longtime KDE user and contributor, I strongly suggest you to avoid Fedora if you want a good experience with KDE.
-- Cyrille Berger

Re:Why is being KDE important?

[pherthyl]

Does it achieve a goal that couldn't have been achieved within the GIMP codebase with less effort?

Perhaps, perhaps not. In any case, Krita is surpassing the Gimp in some areas that people have been complaining about for years in Gimp, and nothing was done. As a developer, what would you rather do, argue on the Gimp mailing list until your face turns blue about wanting to change the interface, or just start your own project? Sometimes you have to make a clean break to get new ideas implemented.

Swedish coincidence?

[wilper]

"rita" is Swedish for "draw". Add the KDE K to get "Krita", which means "crayon" in Swedish. A coincidence?