When comparing Filter Forge vs Quixel Mixer, the Slant community recommends Quixel Mixer for most people. In the question“What are the best programs to create procedural textures?” Quixel Mixer is ranked 5th while Filter Forge is ranked 6th. The most important reason people chose Quixel Mixer is:
Its freaking free.
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Pros
Pro Not only a Photoshop plugin, has a lot of other hosts
Pro Several filters
Filter Forge includes a lot of filters and each of them has several presets. Filters are grouped into different categories (Organic, Patterns, Creative, Distortions, Photo, etc...) so it's easy to locate them.
Pro Large online library of filters
The website has thousands of filters available for download. This is the only thing that makes the basic edition feasible.
Pro Standalone application or PhotoShop plugin
Filter Forge can be used as both a standalone application and as a plugin for PhotoShop.
Pro Free
Its freaking free.
Cons
Con Slow development cycle
New versions come fast enough, but for example, the beta version of 7 doesn't have a lot that 4 didn't have.
Con No free tier
Filter Forge is not free. The basic edition (cheapest one) is $149. It does go on sale regularly though for around $30.
Con Hefty price tag
Its $399 for the professional version, whereas a big competitor used by large studios is only $149.
Con Seems to still be in beta
Many features missing, like layer deletion.
Con Free version is technically non-commercial only
But, uh, "exporting" is as easy as opening up the file locations.
