There are two views in Faststone - the browser, and the image view. The browser (see Browser Image below) has the familiar Windows tree for navigation. It has thumbnails (though you can choose list or details view) in the main pane, and a preview of the selected picture for getting a bigger view without selecting a picture. Faststone doesn't just show images, it can also give you video previes. It stores the preview thumbnails in a database, so once you it loads them the first time, the thumbnails fly up on the screen the next time you view the directory. Oh, and if you like working with RAW files, no problem. Faststone supports every camera model that anyone who actually uses RAW files would own.
Once you've found the picture you want, a double click gets you the single image view. You want to edit? Then edit, my friend.
- Crop? Check.
- Red-eye? Check.
- Resize? Check.
- Rotate? Check.
- Blur/Sharpen? Check.
- Add text, lines, and colors? Check, check, check.
- Brightness/Contrast adjust? Check.
- Histogram? Check
- Plenty more:
- Gray scale, sepia, negative, Red/Green/Blue adjustment
- Watermark, annotation, drop shadow, framing, bump map, lens, morph, waves
Even with all that Faststone can do, if you ever feel like you've gotten in over your head, there is an Edit Menu choice for Edit with External program where you can pick Photoshop or Lightroom or whatever you like for your heavy lifting.
File support comes easy. Virtually any image filetype you've heard of can be opened in Faststone. If you want to convert to another file, either use the conversion tools, or just choose Save As and pick your file type. This feature is great for us writers who use Abduction to get the perfect screenshot. The file comes out as PNG but most websites will only allow you to upload JPG or GIF. Just open the file, Click Save As, pick JPG for the file type. If you want to make it quicker loading, click advanced and choose your quality level all without leaving the save dialog box.
