LunaPic Review

by Aj Tello

Description

Online photo editing application that is completely free. This platform allows for users to import images from their computer, a website or an online album such as Facebook, Picasa or Photobucket. 

Access

This tool is free to use, and is in it's first form. The website to find it is www.lunapic.com. Registration is only necessary if you want to participate in the online forum discussion. 

Sample Usage

A simply edited-photo works well on this website. Color editing and simple techniques can used when on Lunapic. 

What the Tool Does Well

The tool allows for many key features that are included in larger photo editing programs like Photoshop to be used and implemented, for free. 

LunaPic has alot of progress to make, but it already has hundreds of filters, effects and animations to add to your images. Along with the effects, there is a "top rated" section that allows for common effects to be applied quickly.

LunaPic has done a good job trying to allow users the freedom to use filters and effects that are unique and powerful to Larger programs such as Photoshop and Gimp. These effects include cropping, a history menu, and a paintbrush/drawing feature. 

A really cool feature for new users is the tutorials section, that lists plenty of tutorials that will teach users basics on using this application. 

There is also a user-communicated Forum to allow for discussion and q/a time. There are plenty of tutorials on this page as well.

This application also allows for animation which is really cool and unique for online platforms. 

Sharing the finalized image is easy with this program, as they allow for many ways to save. Users who download to their computer will find an instant download link, and then sharing options for social network websites like Facebook and Twitter. Because this application is free, most of its advertisements come from facebook likes and twitter follows.

What it Does Poorly

This program is very adolescent. Every time you click a button or an option, the page has to refresh. This is a major turn-off and time waster. The engine is not particularly strong and crashes regularly. When loading the paint-brush application in a browser other than Internet Explorer, you must wait for the loading screen. I found this lagging of navigation and fluidity of the website to be some of the largest pitfalls. 

The effects menus may be abundant, but do not allow for control over intricacies like more mature photo-editing platforms do. For example when editing saturations, blurs ad other enhancements, you are shown very little (sometimes none) options to edit.

You can't even edit the area where you want to blur.

When chosing a color, the browser moves to a completely new screen, for added inconvenience. 

Sharing via twitter on this platform is not suggested, as they as for password and username.

And because LunaPic is free, there is a lot of noise on the website from moving media advertisements.

Additional Resources

This application is very new, being put together this year in 2013. The power behind the ideas is lacking, and there needs to be more fluidity. Overall this is a great online photo editing software for sharing and quick touchups. Animations and effects add a bit of fun as well!

LunaPic Forum / Tutorials