This is mostly a servicing release to make some small improvements and to fix a few important bugs.
You can get it via the built-in updater by going to Help -> Check for Updates, or by going to the website: http://www.getpaint.net/
Enjoy!
List of changes:
- Improved: Effect rendering should be a little faster now.
- Changed: Implemented some changes to the "Add Noise" effect that were suggested by a forum member.
- Changed: The canvas background color is now always #c0c0c0.
- Changed: The auto-updater should now correctly detect .NET 3.5 and newer, which will help to save bandwidth when Paint.NET v4.0 is released (it will require .NET 3.5).
- Fixed: Paint.NET now works on a system that has the .NET 3.5 SP1 "Client Profile" installed.
- Fixed: When zoomed in and the cursor is to the top-left of the image (negative coordinates), the ruler is now highlighted in the correct area. Fixed: The effect rendering system no longer sets the "Tag" property on the configuration dialog.
- Fixed: Some incorrectly authored plugins would cause a crash when loading their support details (author, copyright, etc.).
- Fixed: There was a bug in the color wheel for IndirectUI that caused it to show the wrong values at initialization.
- Fixed: There was a performance problem for effects that used the IndirectUI color wheel control.
- Fixed: In some rare cases, Paint.NET would crash while shutting down.
- Fixed: When using the "Fixed Ratio" feature of the Rectangle Selection tool, it would crash if 0 was specified for both the width and height.
paint.net blog 
Wow the effects do render faster. What did you change?
Alex — As it turns out, there was something I neglected to optimize in the effect renderer. It was always asking effects to render 1-pixel tall regions. So on an image that was 2000 pixels tall, the Render() code would be called 2000 times. My intent was to consolidate adjacent rectangles and only call the Render() code 75 times per processor core.
Nice updates.
Why does the colour wheel need RGB and HSV? It takes up an awful lot of space. Can you put them sideways or fit something in under the primary and secondary colours?
Also, can you make it possible to scroll the image even when zoomed out so I can move the picture to somewhere out of the way of the Windows? It sometimes gets in the way and I can’t see part of my picture without changing the zoom.
I am saying this here because I’m having problems registering for the Forums. It keeps redirecting me to the Terms and Conditions when I agree. Help?
First, I Love your Program since Version 1.x (I can’t remember when I switched). I used to Work with professional Image Editing softwares like Adobe photoshop. but now, for two reasons I moved to PDN. First, I Changed my field from Designing to Developing and Coding(including minor Design for Websites) and Second, your program is Lite , fast , Powerful and easier to use than Adobe photoshop.
Of course the Graphical engin needs a lot of improvement to reach at that level, Still I prefer PDN to any other program; However, I want to count some short comings which you may consider for next version that I think mostly needed. These are:
1. More Rich Text features such as text edit ability in Layer as in Adobe photoshop or any other Which is Absolutely a need specially for creating an ad for a website foe example!
2. Lasso Tools such as magnetic Lasso and pen tool for easier selection and cutting some part of picture which is a need too!
3. Layer Effects: Just add some simple layer effect such as drop shadow or …
And that’s all My wishes for PDN 4. Hope you care Rick 🙂
At the end, Good luck to you and Great work.
Lots of regards and thanks
I think it would be good if you make it that we can change the direction our fonts face. Like in some logos. I have been wanting to make my words go around in a circle but I can’t.
Silly feature request.
Is it possible for paint.net to remember the last tool that was used? I use paint.net almost always to rectangle select to crop images. It would be nice if there was an option so it would remember that I use that every time I open an image to edit.
Gansqa: I’m not sure, but that sounds like it would require vector graphics—something PN doesn’t include.
Andrew that already exists.
http://www.getpaint.net/doc/latest/en/Toolbar.html
Scroll down until you see “choose defaults”
Um now when i use the feather effect it shows lines also the outline effect. i think ima go back to v.3.5 till this is fixed because i use these effect a lot. but i really happy with the fact that the effects render much faster.
i love this program it simply rocks.
one small request – i use it a LOT to send screenshots; but please stop asking if i want to expand the canvas!!
alan – Use “Paste in to New Image” (Ctrl + Alt + V).
Love this program!
One quality I would love (and one of the only qualities that I miss about Paint Shop Pro) is the ability to do things like lighten, darken, soften, sharpen, etc with a “pen” instead of having it happen over the entire canvas or at best a selected area. I used to be able to spot soften or spot sharpen certain areas of a photo and I dont think this is possible with Paint.net. If Im missing something, please let me know… but if Im not, this would be a wonderful addition to an already great program!
Great software – increasingly using instead of my ‘copy’ of Photoshop at home… Fast and easy to use.
New update is great – looking forward to 4.0.
I would really love to see the magnetic lasso feature that adobe photoshop has in the next version. It is very useful and works better than the magic wand selection tool.
Looking forward to v4.0
Stellar Program! I found it only a few month ago. I do have a request, could you add a select by color?