Pixelmator - offline manual or guides?

Anyone here use Pixelmator?

Does anyone know if its possible to get an offline manual or a book about it?

I know there are online tutorials but my internet is limited at the moment. The 'Help' section only works online too.

Just looking to do some basic photos editing work, and compositing, but the program is not behaving the way I would expect it to.

Here is a good start www.pixelmator.com/tutorials/#basic-tutorials

off line manual www.scribd.com/doc/47577514/Pixelmator-Manual

LOVE Pixelmator!

Thanks Maki for the links, however the PDF is for an older version of Pixelmator, and my internet is just too slow at the moment to watch the video tutorials.

Is anyone else pissed at the way so many programs have a 'Help' guide that only works when the computer is online? Why not just make it offline?

Ben, do you know if there is any official manual for Pixelmator 2.1.4, or any e-books with tutorials?

Anyone using Aperture here too? It seems to be missing too many simple features, hence why I got Pixelmator. But I'm beginning to think I should have just coughed up the dough and got Photoshop (or even Photoshop Elements), which has proper manuals, guides, 3rd party plug-ins, and more importantly is able to do a number of things that both Aperture & Pixelmator lack.....

If you have Photoshop, and it does everything you need, then I'd stick with it. For some of us, Aperture and Pixelmator do everything we need.

I just disconnected from the web, and Pixelmators help came up just fine.

Nah, I dont have Photoshop. I used to have it on a PC a couple of years back, but since I bought a Mac I have been trying to buy Mac-centric software, and support the little software developers over the bigger guys.

I'm not complaining about Pixelmator, I think its a nice piece of software with a great price, but I am a bit confused about the lack of an official manual to download.

I am surprised that your help works offline; when I did an internet search for the manual I came across a lot of complaints from other people mentioning the lack of offline help. Odd.

I dont need a lot of the more unusual plug-ins that Photoshop has, but I was a bit disappointed that things like photo-stitch or photo-merge are missing from both Pixelmator and Aperture (for creating panoramic photos).

Pixelmator is a rather new app, just like FCP X. I view them both in the same light. They both have undergone a lot of evolution, but have much more to go through. Fortunately, both development teams are releasing updates rather quickly.

I remember looking for photo stitching apps in the App Store once and finding several. That's been some time ago, but it may be worth a look. Probably something really cheap out there.

Also, Pixelmator is open to user feedback and feature requests. Drop them a line and see what they say.

Yeah, I think Pixelmator has a bright future ahead; they are off to a good start (I think they were one of the top apps in the app store last year, and they get positive reviews everywhere). The price cant be beat.

I will definitely send them some feedback regarding a PDF manual, and perhaps a photo-merging plug in.

Take a look at the latest version of GIMP as well if you haven't already. Finally got it native in OS X and like Pixelmator its got some things that it does well and some things that it needs work on. Its heading towards a GEGL framework for its next big update which, as I understand it, means its going to incorporate a node based interface. Not sure if its going to be in addition to the layer based interface or not.

I digress. Its free and worth a look.

simonpwood wrote: … I will definitely send them some feedback regarding a PDF manual, and perhaps a photo-merging plug in.

I'm a huge fan of Pixelmator - it offers everything I need for my hobby for an unbeatable price.

The app has changed often & dramatically. I'm actually not happy with the new 'effects hud' - all icons look same = lil' use; before it was a list - lil' use either ....

But I noticed, the Dev Team of Pixelmator is very helpful and responsive!
So, dropping a note, a suggestions or reporting flaws does improve that wonderful program!

.... and a searchable pdf is a must and should be easy to accomplish


■ karsten

Have not looked back since switching to Pixelmator about 5 years ago. Photoshop for me is bloated and looks like a house in which the roof has been raised, a conservatory added and the garage converted into a granny flat! It just does not rock my boat! :whistle:

Also remember that Pixelmator is a Quartz Composer based app. Which means if you take the little time required to learn QC (its actually much easier than most folks think), you can create your own plugins. Similar to Motion 5 & FCP X.

I'm not saying PDF manuals are outdated, not at all. But the motivation for manuals that access the internet is so they can be corrected and updated much more often, much more quickly, much more easily, than a PDF or being forced to wait for a major update of the app. Just saying there is workflow and financial incentives for developers to go that route. We may not like it, but there you have it.

Let developers know what you want.

Pixelmator based on Quartz Composer? Unlikely.

Quartz Composer easy? That's a bit like saying cooking is easy. Toast is easy to cook, a Soufflé is hard to cook.

It is one of the technologies it uses. Core Image, OpenGL, Quartz, etc.

You can interface your QC compositions with it very easily, just like with FCP and Motion. Actually it is way easier to add custom QC compositions, as long as they're not animated.

I've just started learning QC, and I will say it is much easier to learn than you'd think. We finally have a great book for beginners now.

"Learning Quartz Composer: A Hands-On Guide to Creating Motion Graphics with Quartz Composer" by Graham Robinson.