Pixlr 3.0: New Interface, New Brush System, New Packs


Today we release a big update for Pixlr iOS and Android users. It’s our jump to the next generation — to Pixlr 3.0. What’s new? A lot. You’ll notice the difference right away with this app. We’ve completely redesigned the way it looks, but the functionality is for the most part the same as it always was. You’ll find all the same effects, overlays, borders, fonts, and stickers — but we’ve added a few new things that we think you’ll love. (Check out the above video for a quick look at the new interface.)

A whole new brush system

If you’re a power user of our app, you probably know how useful the History Brush is. It lets you add or wipe away effects anywhere you’ve just added. This layer-like functionality both gives you more control over the effects you use, and we’ve now made it available whenever you add an effect. These always-accessible History Brush and Eraser tools are part of new brush technology we’ve implemented from other successful Autodesk apps like Sketchbook. This new system gives us plenty of room to add new brush functionality down the road, and we’ve added a few brushes to begin with: Brighten, Darken, Pixelate, Doodle. Doodle has been a favorite for Android users for a long time, and it’s now available on iOS. Pixelate is an all-new tool that will help fulfill a long-standing request from some users who want to anonymize people’s faces in photos. It also lets you make some really neat art. These new brush tools have options to help you get very detailed with size, feathering, and intensity options. In the example below, we used the Brighten option to spot edit the rocks and a few other details in the foreground to brighten them up a bit.
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Comprehensive photo Adjustments tool

We’ve always had a lot of options for improving your photos by adjusting various details, but they were scattered among many different tools. We’ve consolidated those into the “Adjustment” tool so you can now make all of your color, exposure, and light options in one fell swoop. Just head to Tools > Adjustment and you’ll find Exposure, Temperature, Contrast, Brightness, Vibrance, Highlights, Shadows, Saturation, Lightness, and Hue all together. Whew. That’s a lot of tools that were previously split up. This is sure to save you tons of clicks and make basic editing a lot easier. In the example below, we wanted our early morning Golden Gate Park sunlight to be a bit more sky blue, so we adjusted the temperature.

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 Made with Pixlr feed now in-app

Our community of photo takers has been growing by leaps and bounds over the past year, and with this release we’re happy to be adding the Made with Pixlr stream of user photos in the app. The hashtag-based photo challenges we run every week are now available from the home screen, which means this is a chance for you to have your photo seen not just on the pixlr.com home page, on our Made with Pixlr page, and to our 200K+ Instagram following. Now, your work can be seen by literally millions of people who use our app each week. These challenges aren’t really a competition, but boy it sure feels good when you get featured! Click on each photo to see the story behind the photo. And grab a photo and join in.
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Now supporting 10 additional languages

We’ve always had a strong international following, and now we’re able to offer the app to huge groups of people who have been using the English version but hoping for a localized version just for them. We’ve added 10 new languages: German, French, Italian, Spanish, Japanese, Korean, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, Russian, and Portuguese. We know that a lot of people will be very happy to hear this.

4 new sticker packs for everyone

If none of those features appeal to you, we know something that will: new packs. Everyone loves new packs of content, and we’ve added four brand-new sticker packs with this update:

  • Abstract: Similar to the popular Cosmic Geometry effects, these Abstract stickers can be used as interesting backgrounds. Size them up and dial down the opacity to add geometric interestingness.
  • Tattitude: We’ve long had a Tattoo pack, but we made a new one with some pretty artistic tats.
  • Amore: Finding it hard to say I Love You to someone? Amore stickers to the rescue.
  • Inspiration: Quotes to live by. Like this one!…

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No ads for Pro users

You can pay to remove ads from Pixlr for iOS and Android, but we wanted to make sure we added a way to remove those ads for Pro users. Our yearly Pro subscribers deserve that (for sure!), and we’re happy to report that if you sign in with your Pro subscription, you’ll no longer see ads.
Those are the major details of the update. What’s that you say? You want MORE content packs? Well stay tuned for our next update. We’ve got a lot more planned. We hope you enjoy the new Pixlr 3.0! Let us know what you think of the update by shooting us a message @pixlr on Twitter.