Gradiant Effect

Gradiant Effect is a Paint.net extension developed for those looking to apply horizontal or vertical gradients to their photographs. It enables you to choose the color and generate the effect on two color spaces: RGB and HSV.

How to set it up

In order to work with this plugin, copy the downloaded DLL file to the "Effects" directory of Paint.net's installed folder, relaunch the image editor if it's already running, and pick the new entry from the "Effects" menu. It should be marked with a small icon that resembles a puzzle piece, which is used to label all external add-ons in Paint.net.

Set the gradient type and color options

The configuration panel of Gradiant Effect is small and gives you an overview of all options. You can select the preferred gradient type from a down-down menu (e.g. diagonal from upper left to lower right), allow alpha channel only, swap colors, as well as opt between RGB, HSV and HSV long color channels.
Another factor worth taking into account is that the new gradient effect and adjustments can be previewed in real time. This way, it's not necessary to apply changes and check photo results just to be able to undo the action if you're not satisfied.

Compatibility issues with newer Paint.net

The utility hasn't been updated for a long time. We failed in our attempt to get it up and running with the latest edition of Paint.net in our tests. On the other hand, it worked smoothly with older versions, without causing the image editor to hang, crash or indicate errors.
Taking everything into consideration, Gradiant Effect offers a simple solution for creating an image gradient effect and tweaking settings in Paint.net. However, we cannot overlook the compatibility issues with the most recent versions.