Full-feature image editing on the web, no app required!

Thu Mar 6, 2008 11:53AM EST

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Shelling out hundreds of bucks for Photoshop and clogging up your hard drive with dozens of megabytes of application files is no one's idea of a picnic, but for those people who are interested in creating illustrations, touching up photos, and doing other artistic endeavors, there has really be no alternative than to shell out for such software.

No more: Aviary is a new online service (now in private beta) that lets anyone edit and create images (and more) on the web, no software installation required.

Aviary will ultimately be a suite of 18 media tools, with heavy focus on image editing. Phoenix (they all have bird names) is the centerpiece, a full-fledged image editing system that should be familiar to anyone who's worked with Photoshop. It includes layers, color adjustments, and a host of drawing and selection manipulation tools. I'm hardly an image editing expert, but people are already using Aviary to create some compelling art (primarily in the vein of melding images together). This is powerful software (though, as it's beta, it can be slow to update when you perform complex actions). As Aviary says, "It's not for red-eye removal." (Check the screenshot for sample Aviary art if you don't believe me!)

During the beta, Aviary is free. Pricing has not been announced for the final release. You'll have to sign up using your email address to receive a beta invitation if you want to get in on the action. I got my invite the same day I registered.

Meanwhile, I'm definitely looking forward to the additional apps that Aviary is working on, especially the online video editor, Starling, and its desktop publishing system, Owl. There's even a terrain generator and font editor in the works. Register at the site to get in on the action and watch this Aviary grow!

Comments on Full-feature image editing on the web, no app required!

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  • 6 Posted by cnull on Thu Sep 3, 2009 3:27PM EDT Report Abuse

    For the record, Aviary is obviously NOT appropriate for people working in 100MB-plus file sizes.

  • 7 Posted by agustin2489 on Thu Sep 3, 2009 2:47PM EDT Report Abuse

    I'm intereted in this sort of stuff. Just haven't gotten around to trying. I've played around with a few web-based image editors. rogueist makes a point about the feasibility of playing around with large files. I'd say to use Gimp.

  • 8 Posted by alan_r_cam on Thu Sep 3, 2009 2:49PM EDT Report Abuse

    I'll readily admit, I can't think of a decent online equivalent of CS2. I was merely pointing out how easy it is for an image to become quite large. Provided you are running an application on your machine (as compared to uploading the image to a server) the TYPE of application is actually less relevant than performance / efficiency. In fact, depending on the ability of the "terrain generator" to accept my panorama as an overlay, I could potentially use it to create virtual sets - an interesting prospect.

  • 9 Posted by aa4mw on Thu Sep 3, 2009 2:43PM EDT Report Abuse

    Like all on line apps I would be very concerned about security. Just wait until the mind control folks (aka anti-porn) get involved here! Most on line apps (e.g.backups) allow you to leave the info encrypted, but somehting like this requires that the service have a fully decrypted version! Same problem with the on-line MS Office and Quickbooks equivalents BTW. I get very paranoid when I deal with large amounts of my money. :-)

  • 10 Posted by emm3737 on Thu Sep 3, 2009 3:54PM EDT Report Abuse

    To Aviary and other folks who think they are doing art work when they use less than black characters in their websites: Some of us have poor eyesight and your gray letters make it almost impossible to read the page. We need the contrast of black on white. If you can fix this problem in your website, I may become your customer. Otherwise, your lack of accomodation for my failing sight will preclude me from enjoying your invention and you from enjoying my money. I believe you are required to accomodate those with so-called handicaps, at least certainly from an ethical point of view. Please pass this observation to other website owners who use the light gray text technique to beautify their products. Thank you.

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