Pixelmator for iPhone now available as a free update to existing iPad app

Pixelmator 2.0 for iOS iPhone screenshot 001

As promised, beginning today you can touch up photos, apply fancy effects to images and much more, using Pixelmator for iPhone. Available as a free update to Pixelmator for iPad, Pixelmator is now a universal app supporting any iPhone, iPod touch or iPad with iOS 8.3 or later.

A complete photo editing, painting and layer-based graphic design app for your iPhone, Pixelmator is every bit as powerful as its iPad edition.

Not only does the app include the powerful Repair tool from the iPad edition, but also has some new features such as the new Distort tools and a brand new Clone tool which all take advantage of Apple’s Metal framework in iOS 8 for hardware-accelerated graphics.

As a result, these new tools are incredibly fast and fluid as Metal removes the overhead of Open GL and gives developers close-to-the-metal access to the GPU.

Pixelmator for iPhone includes all of the image effects and filters you’ve come to love in the iPad and Mac editions, such as advanced retouching tools for seamless removal of unwanted objects from images.

Pixelmator 2.0 for iOS iPhone screenshot 005

You’ll love other cool features such as various blending modes, a painting tool for creating watercolor images, a color picker, an eyedropper, a text tool for adding custom text and much more.

And yes, Pixelmator for iPhone supports layered Photoshop files and lets you add your own layers to create some really complex compositions.

Here’s a quick video overview of Pixelmator for iPhone.

A range of brushes are available in the Retouch menu for painting on images with your finger, adjusting image corrections and more. All told, you have more than a hundred brushes at your disposal, including a smear tool for softening edges.

And with the app now available across Macs and iOS devices, Pixelmator for iPhone includes important platform integration features from both the iPad and Mac edition, like iCloud Drive, Handoff and a cool Extension which lets you take advantage of Pixelmator’s powerful image editing tools right inside the stock Photos app in iOS 8.

Check out some more screenshots below.

Pixelmator 2.0 for iOS iPhone screenshot 006

Pixelmator 2.0 for iOS iPhone screenshot 004

Pixelmator 2.0 for iOS iPhone screenshot 003

Pixelmator 2.0 for iOS iPhone screenshot 002

Pixelmator 2.0.1 for iOS changelog:

New features

  • Pixelmator is now available for iPhone.
  • Metal-powered Distort tools allow you to pinch, bump, twirl, and warp areas of your images.
  • The Clone tool lets you duplicate areas of your image.
  • The new Repair Selection feature instantly repairs selected areas.

Other improvements and bug fixes

  • There are now more pre-designed shapes and text styles for you to choose from.
  • We’ve added additional layer templates, too.
  • The new Hue adjustment setting lets you customize the look of Light Leak and Bokeh effects.
  • The enhanced Repair tool interface now lets you cancel repairing while in process, see the percent progress of the repair, and hide the layers palette while still repairing.
  • You can now zoom into your image more than 1000 percent while painting, if you like.
  • Working with text and shape layers is now much faster.
  • Fonts are now sorted just as they should be — alphabetically.
  • You can now see the color value while adjusting the white balance with the Eyedropper.
  • Now you can share more than one image per session via AirDrop.
  • Previously, a newly added layer would appear at the top of the layers palette. Now, it is placed above the selected layer.
  • Full Screen mode now hides the bottom bar of the interface.
  • Previously, the popover menus were hidden after rotating the device. We fixed that.
  • We’ve updated to the latest stylus SDKs for a better painting experience.
  • The app used to quit unexpectedly when it was put to sleep while repairing. Not anymore.
  • We’ve also enhanced the overall performance of the app so you can enjoy a much more seamless image-editing process.

As mentioned before, Pixelmator for iPhone is available at no cost for those who have purchased the iPad edition of the software.

The 98.7-megabyte app supports any iPhone, iPod touch or iPad with iOS 8.3 or later. What you see is exactly what you get as Pixelmator does not hide advanced features behind In-App Purchases.

Pixelmator is $4.99 in the App Store.