
Linux - Creative Software
Video Recording
OBS Studio (also known as Open Broadcaster Software, or OBS) is a screen-casting and live-streaming software available across multiple platforms including macOS, Windows and Linux. Boasting features typically only found in commercial screen recording apps, OBS also provides one of the simplest workflows with an intuitive and easy-to-learn interface that makes recording and streaming a breeze. It's also totally free and open-source.
With its long standing history of continued updates and considering its ease of use and free cost, it's no wonder OBS is one of the most popular and highest recommended apps for screen-casting and live streaming.
NOTABLE FEATURES:
Cross-platform (available for Mac, Windows and Linux). Encoding using H264 (x264) and AAC. Support for Intel Quick Sync Video (QSV), AMF and NVENC. Unlimited number of scenes and sources. Live RTMP streaming to Twitch, YouTube, Mixer, DailyMotion, Smashcast and more. File output to MP4, MKV or FLV. GPU-based game capture for high performance game streaming. DirectShow capture device support (webcams, capture cards, etc). Windows 8 high speed monitor capture support. Bilinear or lanczos3 resampling. Light and dark themes to support various working conditions and preferences.
Video Editing
Complete suite for editing, color correction, and professional audio postproduction, all in a single application.
DaVinci Resolve 16 is the world’s only solution that combines professional 8K editing, color correction, visual effects, and audio postproduction all in one software tool! You can instantly move between editing, color, effects, and audio with a single click. DaVinci Resolve Studio is also the only solution designed for multiuser collaboration so editors, assistants, colorists, VFX artists, and sound designers can all work live on the same project at the same time! Whether you are an individual artist or part of a large collaborative team, it is easy to see why DaVinci Resolve is the standard for high-end postproduction and finishing on more Hollywood feature films, television shows, and commercials than any other software.
Olive is a free non-linear video editor aiming to provide a fully-featured alternative to high-end professional video editing software. Olive is making rapid progress and users are already producing videos with it, but it's still currently in alpha meaning it is incomplete and not fully stable. Regardless we invite you to download the latest build and try it out for yourself. New features are being added every day. Even if Olive is missing something you need, come back in a month or two and it's possible it will have been implemented.
Kdenlive is an acronym for KDE Non-Linear Video Editor. It's free, and open-source and works on GNU/Linux, Windows and BSD. It's an intuitive and powerful multi-track video editor compatible with latest video technologies. Most of the video processing is done by the MLT Framework, which relies on many other open source projects like FFmpeg, frei0r, movit, ladspa, sox, etc. Notable features:
- Multi-track video editing
- Supports all audio and video formats and codecs that FFmpeg does for both input and encoding, including various HD standards, like HDV, DNxHD, AVCHD, ProRes etc.
- Workspaces for each stage of video production; Logging, Editing, Audio, Effects and Color.
- Configurable interface and shortcuts
- Create 2D titles for your projects
- Many effects and transitions
- Keyframeable effects
- Audio and video scopes
- Proxy editing
- Automatic backup project file
- Timeline preview
- Online resources of render profiles, wipes and title templates accessible directly from the interface.
Painting
Krita is a complete creative sketching and painting application with advanced, commercial quality features. It's open-source and available across all major desktop platforms. Krita is free on the official website and paid on Steam and Microsoft Store: the money will support Krita development.
User Interface - An intuitive user interface that stays out of your way. The dockers and panels can be moved and customized for your specific workflow. Once you have your setup, you can save it as your own workspace. You can also create your own shortcuts for commonly used tools.
Pop-up Palette - Quickly pick your color and brush by right-clicking on the canvas.
Brush Stabilizers - Have a shaky hand? Add a stabilizer to your brush to smoothen it out.
Brush Engines - Customize your brushes with 9 unique brush engines.
Wrap-around mode - It is easy to create seamless textures and patterns now. Press the ‘W’ key while painting to toggle wrap-around mode.
Resource Manager - Import brush and texture packs from other artists to expand your tool set.
Layer Management - Krita comes with vector, filter, group, and file layers. Combine, order, and flatten layers to keep organized. Add drop shadows and other simple effects using visual styles.
Full Color Management - Krita supports full color management through LCMS for ICC and OpenColor IO for EXR, allowing you to incorporate Krita into your existing color management pipeline.
Image Manipulation
GIMP is a freely distributed program for such tasks as photo retouching, image composition and image authoring. It can be used as a simple paint program, an expert quality photo retouching program, an online batch processing system, a mass production image renderer, an image format converter, and more.
Non-Destructive RAW Photo Post-Production
darktable is a virtual lighttable and darkroom for photographers: it manages your digital negatives in a database and lets you view them through a zoomable lighttable. it also enables you to develop raw images and enhance them.
This project tries to fill the gap between the many excellent existing free raw converters and image management tools (such as UFRaw or F-Spot). The user interface is built around efficient caching of image metadata and mipmaps, all stored in a database. The user will always be able to interact, even if the full resolution image is not yet loaded.
All editing is fully non-destructive and only operates on cached image buffers for display. The full image is only converted during export. the frontend is written in gtk+/cairo, the database uses sqlite3, raw image loading is done using libraw, hdr, exr and low dynamic range are supported through imagemagick (magickcore). the core operates completely on floating point values, so darktable can not only be used for photography but also for scientifically acquired images or output of renderers (high dynamic range).
RawTherapee is a free RAW converter and digital photo processing software. All changes can be applied and batch processed at a convenient time.
3D-Animation, Modeling etc.
Blender is the free open source 3D content creation suite, available for all major operating systems under the GNU General Public License.
It can be used for modeling, UV unwrapping, texturing, rigging, water simulations, skinning, animating, rendering, particle and other simulations, non-linear editing, compositing, and creating interactive 3D applications, rigid body, fluid, cloth and softbody dynamics, modifier based modeling tools, powerful character animation tools, a node based material and compositing system and Python for embedded scripting.
Blender is Free Software. Free to use for any purpose. Forever.
Game Engine
Godot Engine is a feature-packed, cross-platform game engine to create 2D and 3D games from a unified interface. It provides a comprehensive set of common tools, so that users can focus on making games without having to reinvent the wheel. Games can be exported with one click to a number of platforms, including the major desktop platforms (Linux, macOS, Windows), mobile platforms (Android, iOS), as well as Web-based platforms (HTML5) and consoles.
FEATURES
Visual editor, full of mature tools. Uncluttered UI, with context-sensitive editors. Amazing scene system, supporting instancing and inheritance. Friendly content creation interfaces for artists, level designers, animators, … Visual shader editing for 2D and 3D. Persistent live editing (changes are not lost after stopping the game). Live editing on mobile devices!
Vector Graphics Editor
Inkscape is an Open Source vector graphics editor, with capabilities similar to Illustrator, CorelDraw, or Xara X, using the W3C standard Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) file format.
It supports many advanced SVG features (markers, clones, alpha blending, etc.) and great care is taken in designing a streamlined interface. It is very easy to edit nodes, perform complex path operations, trace bitmaps and much more. We also aim to maintain a thriving user and developer community by using open, community-oriented development.
Audio
Audacity is free, open source software for recording and editing sounds. You can use Audacity to record live audio, convert tapes and records, edit sound files, change the speed or pitch of a recording and much more.
LMMS is a free cross-platform alternative to commercial programs like FL Studio , which allow you to produce music with your computer. This includes the creation of melodies and beats, the synthesis and mixing of sounds, and arranging of samples. You can have fun with your MIDI-keyboard and much more; all in a user-friendly and modern interface.