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Beginning GIMP: From Novice to Professional 2nd Ed
r3lody writes "An extremely large amount of the information we get on a daily basis comes from what we see. Imagery is therefore very important to those who want to communicate with us. When computers had advanced enough to be able to process images in a digital fashion, the market opened up for programs that could manipulate them in many ways. While many professionals would opt for the paid programs, there is a free alternative: GIMP (Gnu Image Manipulation Program). The only stumbling block is learning how to use it properly. That is where Beginning GIMP: From Novice to Professional, Second Edition by Akkana Peck comes in." Read below for the rest of Ray's review.
Beginning GIMP: From Novice to Professional, Second Edition
author
Akkana Peck
pages
584
publisher
Apress
rating
8/10
reviewer
Ray Lodato
ISBN
1430210702
summary
An easy-to-read, fairly complete introduction to image processing with GIMP
I first attempted to use GIMP to fix a photograph or two of mine, but was quickly bogged down in the many options available in the program. That is why I was happy to get my hands on a copy of Beginning GIMP. The book is based mainly on GIMP 2.4, but the author included a preview of GIMP 2.6 in Appendix D. When I downloaded the latest verson of GIMP from gimp.org, I received GIMP 2.6.0. So I used the PortableApps version of GIMP (2.4.6) on Windows XP while reviewing the book and found only minor variations from the text.
One thing that strikes you as you open the book is the extensive use of color. Most texts are black-and-white throughout, but here you are presented with a pleasantly colorful tome. To follow the examples as best as I could, I downloaded the images available on the gimpbook.com web site. Although the images are supposed to be for the 2nd edition, several of those shown in the text for demonstrations purposes are not included. It appears that the images for the tools new to GIMP 2.4 are missing from the web site. This is surprising, since the 1st edition of the book covered version 2.4, so you would expect the images to be there.
The book begins by giving the reader a brief tour of the three main windows of GIMP: the Toolbox window, the Layer/Channels/Path/Undo window, and the Image window. Some basic navigation is presented, along with tear-off menus and how to modify tool placement. It concludes with a simple project layering a small image onto a larger one was given. Unfortunately, the files supplied from the web site did not include the PNG file used in the text, so it's difficult to reproduce the picture as shown. I later found the missing image in a GIMP-format file called wilber.xcf.gz. Unfortunately, xcf files are not discussed until the next chapter.
After the simple introduction, the author, Akkana Peck, gets into the most common adjustments a beginning user might need: re-sizing, cropping, rotating, brightening and darkening, and fixing red-eye. Each manipulation is presented with careful step-by-step instructions. I was able to match the pictures shown in the book, providing me with a level of comfort that I was learning the right way to fix photos.
One of the most common and useful methods of altering photographs uses the concept of layers. Layers act like cinematic cels, being mostly transparent with some opaque portions to lay on top of other layers. Chapter 3 gives a clear description of how to use layers to make changes. Two sample projects use layers to add text and another image to an existing photo, and to create an animated GIF using a series of layers for each frame of the animation. While I found minor differences between the text and the version of GIMP I used, I had no real problem understanding how the concept is applied.
You will probably need to do some freehand drawing from time to time, and chapter 4 covers the tools you'll need. While these tools are familiar to anyone who has used a basic painting program like Microsoft Paint, there are enough differences in how they are applied to warrant their own chapter. After creating some basic shapes (rectangle and circles), outlining and filling them, the author explores various fills and patterns. The chapter ends with a tutorial of creating a tree in a planter box, using just the drawing tools.
Every tool you use in GIMP works on the current selection. Knowing how to select just the parts of the image you want affected is important to getting the results you want. The author devotes an entire chapter to the numerous ways to select areas, add to or subtract from the selections, and fine-tuning them to only touch the parts you want touched. Basic rectangle, ellipse, and free-hand selections are followed by more sophisticated methods including the intelligent scissors and SIOX (Simple Interactive Object Extraction). The book also shows how to save selections as channels, so you can return to them in future editing sessions.
Sometimes, however, all you really need to do is a little touch-up on a photograph. Is someone's face in shadow or too much sun? Did you wish to get rid of some little irritating extra in a photo? Maybe you just wanted to draw attention to one subject and blur out the rest. Chapter 6 provides the information on how to make these basic adjustments. Darkroom techniques called dodging and burning provide minor adjustments to brightness, while cloning and healing can completely eradicate unwanted portions of the image. To draw attention to portions of the picture, you can enhance it using the blur and sharpen tools.
In addition to simple adjustments, GIMP offers a plethora of various tools to modify or create images. Under the Filters menu, you will find a large selection of tools. When I first looked, I felt that there were so many, who would need all of them? In the Filters and Effects chapter, Akkana Peck goes through them all, showing how they can be used to enhance your image. Because there are so many, she does not provide examples of each effect, but each one is described and you are encouraged to play. Remember, Undo is your friend here!
Chapter 8 delves into a very important aspect of your photos and drawings — the colors. First, the concepts of the RGB (Red-Green-Blue) and CMY (Cyan-Magenta-Yellow) colorspaces are described, followed by the HSV (Hue-Saturation-Value) space. A lot of time is used reviewing how these different colorspaces are used, and how they can be manipulated. The tools for breaking the image into its component layers, and demonstrations on how manipulating them can enhance your photo follow. The chapter concludes with some discussion on color profiles.
Now that you've learned quite a few niceties of GIMP, you need to learn more advanced techniques. The next two chapters go into more detail about drawing and compositing. The chapter on Advanced Drawing covers three main topics: mask and layer modes, realism using perspective and shading, and making new brushes, patterns and gradients. The Layer Mode section is the most interesting, showing how blending layers using various modes other than simple overlays can produce interesting effects. There are a number of examples, all easily followed and replicated. Once you've got a basic understanding of the advanced drawing techniques, it's time to put them to use on photographs. The chapter on Advanced Compositing shows how to use layer modes to play with images to improve their looks. You can brighten images, improve contrast, create eerie landscapes, fix noisy photos, and create panoramas, all using various layer modes. Many examples are shown, so you can get a good feel for the technique.
GIMP plug-ins provide automated tasks for the user. In fact, a number of GIMP's tools are provided by plug-ins. A variety of languages is supported. Plug-in scripts can be written in Scheme (the default — always installed), Python, and Perl (if available on your computer). If you need greater speed, you can write a plug-in in C. Chapter 11 uses the sphere plug-in as an example. Xtns — Misc — Sphere creates a sphere on a solid background. Akkana explains how to modify the script to provide a transparent background. A full discussion of the programming of the original script follows. Each step is carefully explained so only a minimal amount of programming background is needed to understand the concepts. Finally, examples in Python, Perl and C round out the chapter. Also included are explanations of how to find plug-ins and help on callable routines.
Unfortunately, there is so much to GIMP that one medium-sized book cannot contain it all. There is a potpourri of topics in the final chapter, including printing, scanning, setting preferences and the configuration files. The chapter ends with information on where to go for more help, source code, and images.
The appendices offer information on how to get and install GIMP, how to install it on older systems, and how to build it from source. Naturally, GIMP is always evolving, and Appendix D offers a list of enhancements in GIMP 2.6 that were not incorporated into the main text.
Over the course of reading the book, I had very little trouble reproducing the examples as demonstrated. I must admit that, despite the book's subtitle: From Novice to Professional, I am now at best an intermediate user. The depth of the capabilities available within GIMP is much deeper than the author could provide in the text. At almost 600 pages, this book is just about the right size, and provides the right amount of instruction for most people. The Additional Topics chapter provides information and links for further study and training, for those so inclined. If you are a beginner to image manipulation, and want to get fairly proficient with GIMP, then definitely get Beginning GIMP. It's not leaving my desk any time soon.
You can purchase Beginning GIMP: From Novice to Professional, Second Edition from amazon.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
One thing that strikes you as you open the book is the extensive use of color. Most texts are black-and-white throughout, but here you are presented with a pleasantly colorful tome. To follow the examples as best as I could, I downloaded the images available on the gimpbook.com web site. Although the images are supposed to be for the 2nd edition, several of those shown in the text for demonstrations purposes are not included. It appears that the images for the tools new to GIMP 2.4 are missing from the web site. This is surprising, since the 1st edition of the book covered version 2.4, so you would expect the images to be there.
The book begins by giving the reader a brief tour of the three main windows of GIMP: the Toolbox window, the Layer/Channels/Path/Undo window, and the Image window. Some basic navigation is presented, along with tear-off menus and how to modify tool placement. It concludes with a simple project layering a small image onto a larger one was given. Unfortunately, the files supplied from the web site did not include the PNG file used in the text, so it's difficult to reproduce the picture as shown. I later found the missing image in a GIMP-format file called wilber.xcf.gz. Unfortunately, xcf files are not discussed until the next chapter.
After the simple introduction, the author, Akkana Peck, gets into the most common adjustments a beginning user might need: re-sizing, cropping, rotating, brightening and darkening, and fixing red-eye. Each manipulation is presented with careful step-by-step instructions. I was able to match the pictures shown in the book, providing me with a level of comfort that I was learning the right way to fix photos.
One of the most common and useful methods of altering photographs uses the concept of layers. Layers act like cinematic cels, being mostly transparent with some opaque portions to lay on top of other layers. Chapter 3 gives a clear description of how to use layers to make changes. Two sample projects use layers to add text and another image to an existing photo, and to create an animated GIF using a series of layers for each frame of the animation. While I found minor differences between the text and the version of GIMP I used, I had no real problem understanding how the concept is applied.
You will probably need to do some freehand drawing from time to time, and chapter 4 covers the tools you'll need. While these tools are familiar to anyone who has used a basic painting program like Microsoft Paint, there are enough differences in how they are applied to warrant their own chapter. After creating some basic shapes (rectangle and circles), outlining and filling them, the author explores various fills and patterns. The chapter ends with a tutorial of creating a tree in a planter box, using just the drawing tools.
Every tool you use in GIMP works on the current selection. Knowing how to select just the parts of the image you want affected is important to getting the results you want. The author devotes an entire chapter to the numerous ways to select areas, add to or subtract from the selections, and fine-tuning them to only touch the parts you want touched. Basic rectangle, ellipse, and free-hand selections are followed by more sophisticated methods including the intelligent scissors and SIOX (Simple Interactive Object Extraction). The book also shows how to save selections as channels, so you can return to them in future editing sessions.
Sometimes, however, all you really need to do is a little touch-up on a photograph. Is someone's face in shadow or too much sun? Did you wish to get rid of some little irritating extra in a photo? Maybe you just wanted to draw attention to one subject and blur out the rest. Chapter 6 provides the information on how to make these basic adjustments. Darkroom techniques called dodging and burning provide minor adjustments to brightness, while cloning and healing can completely eradicate unwanted portions of the image. To draw attention to portions of the picture, you can enhance it using the blur and sharpen tools.
In addition to simple adjustments, GIMP offers a plethora of various tools to modify or create images. Under the Filters menu, you will find a large selection of tools. When I first looked, I felt that there were so many, who would need all of them? In the Filters and Effects chapter, Akkana Peck goes through them all, showing how they can be used to enhance your image. Because there are so many, she does not provide examples of each effect, but each one is described and you are encouraged to play. Remember, Undo is your friend here!
Chapter 8 delves into a very important aspect of your photos and drawings — the colors. First, the concepts of the RGB (Red-Green-Blue) and CMY (Cyan-Magenta-Yellow) colorspaces are described, followed by the HSV (Hue-Saturation-Value) space. A lot of time is used reviewing how these different colorspaces are used, and how they can be manipulated. The tools for breaking the image into its component layers, and demonstrations on how manipulating them can enhance your photo follow. The chapter concludes with some discussion on color profiles.
Now that you've learned quite a few niceties of GIMP, you need to learn more advanced techniques. The next two chapters go into more detail about drawing and compositing. The chapter on Advanced Drawing covers three main topics: mask and layer modes, realism using perspective and shading, and making new brushes, patterns and gradients. The Layer Mode section is the most interesting, showing how blending layers using various modes other than simple overlays can produce interesting effects. There are a number of examples, all easily followed and replicated. Once you've got a basic understanding of the advanced drawing techniques, it's time to put them to use on photographs. The chapter on Advanced Compositing shows how to use layer modes to play with images to improve their looks. You can brighten images, improve contrast, create eerie landscapes, fix noisy photos, and create panoramas, all using various layer modes. Many examples are shown, so you can get a good feel for the technique.
GIMP plug-ins provide automated tasks for the user. In fact, a number of GIMP's tools are provided by plug-ins. A variety of languages is supported. Plug-in scripts can be written in Scheme (the default — always installed), Python, and Perl (if available on your computer). If you need greater speed, you can write a plug-in in C. Chapter 11 uses the sphere plug-in as an example. Xtns — Misc — Sphere creates a sphere on a solid background. Akkana explains how to modify the script to provide a transparent background. A full discussion of the programming of the original script follows. Each step is carefully explained so only a minimal amount of programming background is needed to understand the concepts. Finally, examples in Python, Perl and C round out the chapter. Also included are explanations of how to find plug-ins and help on callable routines.
Unfortunately, there is so much to GIMP that one medium-sized book cannot contain it all. There is a potpourri of topics in the final chapter, including printing, scanning, setting preferences and the configuration files. The chapter ends with information on where to go for more help, source code, and images.
The appendices offer information on how to get and install GIMP, how to install it on older systems, and how to build it from source. Naturally, GIMP is always evolving, and Appendix D offers a list of enhancements in GIMP 2.6 that were not incorporated into the main text.
Over the course of reading the book, I had very little trouble reproducing the examples as demonstrated. I must admit that, despite the book's subtitle: From Novice to Professional, I am now at best an intermediate user. The depth of the capabilities available within GIMP is much deeper than the author could provide in the text. At almost 600 pages, this book is just about the right size, and provides the right amount of instruction for most people. The Additional Topics chapter provides information and links for further study and training, for those so inclined. If you are a beginner to image manipulation, and want to get fairly proficient with GIMP, then definitely get Beginning GIMP. It's not leaving my desk any time soon.
You can purchase Beginning GIMP: From Novice to Professional, Second Edition from amazon.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
What the author of the review doesn't explain is the niche Gimp fills.
- Why use such a complex piece of software for fixing red-eye or cropping?
- Why one needs to use PS for certain prepress jobs.
- Why one should use Film-Gimp (Cinepaint) for its 16-bit deep editing abilities.
Gimp is not appropriate for every job, just like Perl or C++ have niches, and a review should explain what the appropriate tasks are.
This is not a signature.
I flipped through Beginning GIMP in the bookstore, but I ultimately went with GIMP 2 for Photographers because my only real concern is editing photos that I've taken. You're right that game designers use GIMP, but so do people on *nix boxes who just want to retouch less than perfect photos. GIMP is such a multifaceted tool with diverse user communities that a guide to the program can't be everything for everyone.
I love the Gimp. I find many features are easier to learn than Photoshop. It goes both ways though... some stuff is much nicer in Photoshop. I miss a few features though - Gimp doesn't do 16 bits per color channel (yet), and it doesn't do clipping paths in JPEG files (which arent part of the JPEG standards). If it could do both of these it would meet all my professional needs.
Never ask for directions from a two-headed tourist! -Big Bird
It's really interesting how professionals pretty much ignore the GIMP in favor of Photoshop.
Both toolkits have plenty of features, and GIMP certainly has many of the necessary features the Photoshop has provided for a while. Layers, filters, etc, GIMP has many of them. And support for plug-ins also helps make the case for the image editor.
But in the end, professionals use Photoshop. It would be a pleasant surprise to hear that the last chapter of the book "Beginning GIMP: From Novice to Professional" was dedicated to the purchasing of Photoshop.
-1 Spam
Takes some getting use to but it is very powerful and I currently use it side by side with photoshop (GIMP has some interesting features not in CS3)
I want to say thanks for the people that toil over these free programs.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
Why didn't they name it "Bringing Out the Gimp" From Novice to Professional 2nd Ed
Seriously, who wouldn't buy this book with that name?
If nothing else, you'd get some awesome looks in your office when people see it sitting on your bookshelf. (right next to your orange ball-gag, of course)
Sent from your iPad.
I've got Gimp 2.6.1 on my box. Why would I want to buy a new book published about the 2.4 series?
As goofy as the Adobe GUI is, Photoshop is the poop, pure and simple, and all other image appas are compared to it. Painter, for example is slower and clumsier, but it has awesome brushes, MS Paint is its own hobbled ugliness but has its uses, GIMP is ugly and retarded, but it's free and it works, etc. The day Adobe puts CS on Linux is the day GIMP gets a stake driven through its heart. Ad that day can't come too soon, IMHO. I'd love to run CS on a Linux box and be done with Mac AND Windows and run on generic hardware.
I've been advocating for YEARS for Adobe to sell Linux boxen with CS locked on and pre-installed. They could give the computer away for practically free. BUY SOFTWARE - FREE COMPUTER!
I would also suggest that Adobe needs to jump on this now, as Linux is gaining greater acceptance, GIMP will also, and they don't want GIMP to rule that platform - first in and all that.
I'll definitely buy this book. I dislike GIMP intensely, but knowing it better might take an edge off.
RS RS
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
In the beginning, there was the General Image Manipulation Program, and it was good, if primitive. This was the first year.
Then was created version 0.56, and even though it still depended on Motif, it was still good. It was the second year.
In the third year, version 0.60 was releasedeth, and the name changethed to GNU Image Manipulation Program.
The rest is history.
"are about arranging all windows from GIMP so the novice can start drawing"
It is not a drawing application. But yeah, all 3 windows, wow. Better than PS on the Mac. It is one large window that takes up your whole 2560x1600 screen to edit your 1024x1024 Flickr photo.
Just because it does not have an MDI it doesn't mean the GUI is bad. Gimp's interface follows a common pattern amongst *nix software -- or what they used to look like.
I'll always be a cheapskate.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Well, Freedom for one, and price for another.
Fascism starts when the efficiency of the government becomes more important than the rights of the people.
Fixed that for you.
when it comes GIMP that is. I downloaded GIMP a few months ago to try it out and because I needed something to make simple graphics for a class I was taking in XNA.
I wanted to draw a circle with some sort of automated device to point click and drag out the size of what I needed.
I never figured out how to do it. I spent about 15 minutes (yeah I'm impatient, bite me) looking for some kind of plugin to do so, nothing was immediately apparent, or easy to install for that matter. So I gave up and downloaded paint.net, which fulfilled all my needs instantly.
I'm pretty new to trying to get deeper into computers but this was not a good start for me, and instantly dropped this sort of venture down a few points in my eyes.
I might however give this book a try, maybe I'll find a gem within this tangled mess yet. However this book may be too little to convince those looking for simple functionality. I think that too many people have been infected with the need for everything they want to be there right away. At least in regards to simple functions, if I want to make a stick figure I shouldn't have to read a readme file, I should have line and circle drawing tools immediately apparent.
This is the part where you all say "Stupid Hoyty1, the button you needed was right there."
My Comic : www.ourbadidea.com
Blame the artist for all mistakes!
Many times when I'm working with it, I put my browser in focus and then my email client and maybe something else. When I go back to GIMP by clicking on one of the taskbar items or one of th window frames, only that particular GIMP window comes up, upon which, I have to go hunting for the window that I actually need at that time. I wish ALL the GIMP windows would come into focus.
No, I don't like the UI at all: it's too confusing, cumbersome, redundant, and complex.
Like it or not, the Windows and Mac UIs are the standards that just about everyone expects with regards to GUIs.
And just what do you think is "improper" about the one it has now?
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
Just because it does not have an MDI it doesn't mean the GUI is bad.
This is true as far as it goes. MDI is a blight on UI design that belongs in the dustbin of history. However...
Gimp's interface follows a common pattern amongst *nix software -- or what they used to look like. ...just because it follows patterns established on systems that were never designed for GUIs in the first place and never really "got" the concept for years even after the introduction of X11 doesn't mean the UI is good. GIMP has made great strides in usability since 1.0, but it still has quite a long way to go. There's a reason it was, and still is to some degree, the poster child for bad GUIs on Linux.
A proprietary book? Insults my FOSS ethics, it does!
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
"From Novice to Professional"
Sorry no, but in your dreams. GIMP is not a professional tool -- very far from it. It's has little more functionality than Elements. It lacks essential professional tools. It's worthless to a professional.
Perhaps the subtitle should be "From Novice to Enthusiastic Amateur".
That may be so, but with all those windows and the redundant access to functions, it just adds unneeded complexity and confusion.And if you have an email client open, browser and a file browser open, you have a very busy desktop and taskbar.
Giving The Gimp its own virtual desktop considerably eases these problems.
there will nearly be as many usages of the word 'photoshop' as there will be 'gimp' for this story
Want to move your gimp session to a different virtual desktop? must move at least 3 windows. what a pain in the ass.
The GIMP's UI is what keeping most of the potential users from using it.
Maybe a Photoshop UI compatibility mode for GIMP would help.
I am NOT an artist, photographer or other graphic professional, but I have had serious need to act like one in my job.
I didn't want to buy a giant commercial package, because I didn't need that kind of investment in occasional products. The Gimp to the rescue!
The book, for someone like me, was vital to actually learning and using the tools available, and really gave me a chance to understand what I was doing as I learned how to do things.
-- I really need to bleed off some of this
That's what I do on Linux. But on Windows, that's obviously not an option (at least not without virtual desktop software, which comes with its own set of problems.)
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
A lot of free software documentation is released under free licenses these days. Was this? Or maybe a non-free but still liberal license like CreativeCommons Attribution-NonCommercial or something?
(Might be good to tweak the Slashdot book review guidelines to make stating the license a standard part of these reviews...)
http://www.red-bean.com/kfogel
check out gimpshop.
"Linux is for noobs"-The new MS fud strategy
1. Select a part of the image with a selection tool.
2. Click and drag the selected part.
3. You probably thought the selected part will be moved? Nope. It's the selection which got moved.
4. OK, let's try to move it with CTRL or ALT. No, it still does something else.
5. Ah, the 'Move' tool. Finally you can move those tricky pixels! Wait, the whole layer got moved instead, oh shi...
6. ???
7. F**k it, fire up Photoshop.
it needs a proper UI.
excuse me, PS needs a proper UI too!
metageek
I've been using Gimp (on Windows) for quite awhile, even use it for some 2D games and such. It's actually fairly easy to use. Now I've actually managed to click with Blender...tried it a few times over the years and I just couldn't quite "get it". But now that I'm rolling along with that it's quite exciting to be able to do so much for free! Especially since Autodesk seems to own everything else; so it doesn't look like affordable commercial packages will be out any time soon. I may have to donate to both of the projects, assuming they take donations. I own Zbrush 3, which looks like to will work well with Blender now that I know what I'm doing (somewhat). Yay OSS! Still using Windows there, so :P
Adobe must be scared to send its astroturfers here.
(There: this post as unfounded and baseless as yours)
Nothing beats Gimp on Linux but in Windows I'm a fan of Paint.NET over Gimp just because the interface works better for me.
And just what do you think is "improper" about the one it has now?
the multiple windows. It interferes with multiple desktops, other app windows and some focus policies, that regularly get me to select the wrong image or present the options for a tool in a window below the image (so I go window hunting). ... Photoshop.
And yes, I use only Gimp, have used it for numerous many projects, I use more than the average 25% of its features, know many keyboard shortcuts, and am a total Linux fan (have nothing else at home).
It should be a docking app, like Eclipse, Kdevelop, Karbon, and
Drawing with a mouse is like drawing with a brick. You need a graphics tablet.
Just get something like this http://www.amazon.com/Bamboo-Small-Tablet-Graphics-Software/dp/B000V9NU2A/ref=pd_bbs_sr_6?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1237396057&sr=8-6 for less than $100 and you get Adobe Photoshop Elements 5.0 Win/4.0 Mac, Corel Painter Essentials 4.0, and Nik Color Efex Pro 2.0 GE included for free.
It's not CS4, but much cleaner than the Gimp.
Get the Gimp if you want to program, get some graphics software and a tablet if you need to draw.
man you really love to push that silly rpg site don't you?
Stop spamming that stupid fucking site, moron.
"You can either have software quality or you can have pointer arithmetic, but you cannot have both at the same time."
Gimpshop is a disgustingly stupid attempt at reimplementing Gimp in an MDI. It's like a bicycle with a helicopter interface: awkward and doesn't make any sense whatsoever. Also, it's several years outdated.
Press "F".
Works in CS3 and 4, probably also older versions, but that's too far back for me to remember.
"Beginning GIMP." "The GIMP for Dummies." You can't help it. You just cringe.
1. The Master's Manual: A Handbook of GIMP Dominance
2. How to be Kinky: A Beginner's Guide to GIMP
3. Safe Word: GIMP
4. GIMP Protocols: Handbook for the female slave
5. SM 101: GIMP, a realistic introduction
6. Beginning GIMP: From Novice to Professional
How exactly is this any different than MDI?
Good one.
Nope... It is ye good olde:
Even the "downloadable sample chapter"
Incidentally - it is also interesting to point out that it is printed and bound in China.
By adequately payed and humanely treated Chinese workers. Probably. Maybe.
It was written and printed to be sold for MONEY.
Not because someone woke up one morning and said to themselves "My-my... world could sure use a book about that free piece of software, and who better than me to write it - ME an Expert in writing such books.".
And if you want something sold for money, by people who sell such things - you go with the most common copyright.
If you want to sell the book yourself or let your friends sell it for you - you go with whichever license you like.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
It's worthless to a professional.
Oops - Sounds like someone just dropped some major dollarage on PS!
To anyone with mod points:
This slashdot user (jetsci) posts on slashdot solely to publicize wittyrpg.
I'm surprised this post got an informative mod (what doe sit tell us? That GIMP is useful for image manipulation on non-Windows machines?), but kindly please mod it back down to oblivion so we don't need to keep reading yet another crap most meant just to get a link on slashdot.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
Enough with the 'I wanted to draw a circle' FUD .. go home MS astroturfers your shift is up ..
davecb5620@gmail.com
Accidentally modded this informative. I'd rather not mod something up that is advertising violation of copyright.
My point being, how much would it cost me WITHOUT "Adobe Photoshop Elements 5.0 Win/4.0 Mac, Corel Painter Essentials 4.0, and Nik Color Efex Pro 2.0 GE"
Because, you see, I don't need them...And I must somehow pay for them along with the tablet, because except for FOSS, there is no free beer...
It takes 40+ muscles to frown, but only four to extend your arm and bitchslap the motherfucker
How should the Gimp's GUI look?
(This is a serious question, I agree with your MDI comments, but am not sure what's so wrong with GIMP's gui as it is now)
I wish to remain anomalous
"won't fix" means if you want it fixed, you pay someone to do it.
So stop whinging.
Your post is quite informative, but it doesn't help me, for reasons that are very typical of Gimp.
My Gimp installation is in Brazilian Portuguese language. There are 25 entries in the Dialogs menu, but none that even remotely resembles anything like "path" translated to Portuguese. There is no option in the Preferences menu to change the language to English.
So, thank you for your helpful attitude, but unfortunately it didn't solve my problem. And I've found that this is very typical of the convoluted Gimp user interface. Year ago I read "Grokking the Gimp", and did some work based on what I read there. But there were always those problems. First, the instructions are in English, the Gimp is localized, there's no clear way to find the corresponding menus in the international version. Second, items are frequently moved from one menu to the other in different versions. Unless you have the exact Gimp version the author used, there's no guarantee that you will find the tool you need in the same places.
It's sad but true, the Gimp needs an intensive reworking in the user interface to become useful, and this situation does not seem to be improving in newer versions.
Not if you sticky the windows, switch, and unsticky.
http://sourcemage.org/ - Have fun
It can be adjusted for very fast work, and its algorithms are clear and magical. It is one of the best machines on Earth. I see it also like sort of a poem written in code. I would like to thank the developers, artists and documenters of GIMP (2.6.5 already):
* Spencer Kimball * Peter Mattis
* Henrik Brix Andersen * Nicola Archibald * Hans Breuer * Simon Budig * João S. O. Bueno Calligaris * Seth Burgess * Stephane Chauveau * Zbigniew Chyla * David Costanzo * Jay Cox * Kevin Cozens * Karine Delvare * Daniel Egger * Pedro Alonso Ferrer * Piotr Filiciak * Shlomi Fish * Sylvain Foret * Gerald Friedland * Daniel Richard G * GG * Saul Goode * David Gowers * Dov Grobgeld * Michael Hammel * Robert Helgesson * Kristian Jantz * Róman Joost * Geert Jordaens * Aurimas Juska * Øyvind Kolås * Robert L Krawitz * Eric Lamarque * Tobias Lenz * Frederic Leroy * Adrian Likins * Tor Lillqvist * Kjartan Maraas * John Marshall * Loren Merritt * Chris Mohler * Chris Moller * Tim Mooney * Adam D Moss * Michael Natterer * David Neary * Sven Neumann * Martin Nordholts * David Odin * Robert Ögren * Akkana Peck * Nils Philippsen * Ari Pollak * Raphaël Quinet * Maurits Rijk * Clarence Risher * Stefan Röllin * Guillermo S. Romero * Michael Schumacher * Peter Sikking * Ted Shaneyfelt * Jernej Simoni * Manish Singh * Mukund Sivaraman * William Skaggs * Kevin Sookocheff * Jakub Steiner * Nathan Summers * Owen Taylor * Patrice Tremblay * Helvetix Victorinox * Matthew Wilson * Karl Günter Wünsch * Yoshinori Yamakawa
Artists
Contributing icons, cursors, brushes, gradients, patterns, etc.
* Lapo Calamandrei * Paul Davey * Karl La Rocca * Andreas Nilsson * Carol Spears * Jakub Steiner * William Szilveszter
Documenters
Contributing documentation
* Marco Ciampa * Dust * Ulf-D. Ehlert * Alessandro Falappa * Jakub Friedl * Michael Hammel * Julien Hardelin * Róman Joost * Hans de Jonge * Semka Kuloviæ-Debals * Manuel Quiñones * Nickolay V. Shmyrev * Axel Wernicke
Special thanks to Jernej Simoni for Windows installer.
Flaimbait? Try "Funny".
My fault for not using a tilda, I suppose.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
A) I was being funny.
B) Just becasue one thing is a pile of crap, doesn't mean it's OK becasue it's competitor is also a pile of crap.
C) It is confusing and overwhelming to new users.
D) It doesn't look 'clean' and it looks dated.
E) Its MDI is a mess.
I was just taking a jab at it's reputation. I have only used it maybe a dozen times. Coincidentally I just downloaded a recent version last week. and it still looks worse then VB5
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
The current one is horrible. By default it opens an empty image window and a toolbox window. If you close either of these two windows the application exits. I with they had never fiddled with the UI. The original one was very good IMO.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
Well, they just seem very hesitant to implement a tabbed single-window UI or much better, move to a decent GUI toolkit like Qt.
Want to hear the voice of GOD? cat
And GIMP may never do 16 bit colour channels. It's been almost 10 years since a developer added 16 bit depth per colour channel. But the maintainers of GIMP did not add this capability, so the developer forked it and started Film GIMP now called CinePaint.
If it could do both of these it would meet all my professional needs.
Have you tried CinePaint? I'm using Mac OS X now and though there's a version of CinePaint for OS X it's not native and needs X11. Unfortunately I haven't been able to get CinePaint to work so I've been thinking of installing Ubuntu, when the new long term support version comes out, on my Mac. If I do I'll be able to try and see if it will work for me, I want to get into photography. If it works it will save me money but if not then I may end up paying for Photoshop.
Should there be a Law?
It's really interesting how professionals pretty much ignore the GIMP in favor of Photoshop.
One reason is because GIMP does not do 16 never mind 24 or 32 bits per colour channel. While GIMP's 8 bits per channel works for the web it does not cut it for print. CYMK, cyan, yellow, magenta, and black, output is also needed for print. I think GIMP 2.6 added it but older versions do not offer it. Without these two capabilities, which are important for many pros, pros have little reason to use GIMP.
On the other hand CinePaint does do them. However many graphics/photography pros use Macs and CinePaint doesn't work well in OS X.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
he day Adobe puts CS on Linux is the day GIMP gets a stake driven through its heart. Ad that day can't come too soon, IMHO. I'd love to run CS on a Linux box and be done with Mac AND Windows and run on generic hardware.
Thanks to a how-to posted yesterday, here's a guide to Installing Photoshop on Ubuntu Linux. However it's for PS 7. Though they can be made to run there are issues with CS.
I'll definitely buy this book. I dislike GIMP intensely, but knowing it better might take an edge off.
I won't buy this book as is but if it was about using CinePaint I'd jump on it.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
You apparently need a better window manager.
If you find it interfering with other app windows, put all your GIMP windows on a separate desktop.
Please, please, please no. The fewer of those created, the sooner we can abandon that broken stinking wreck of an interface concept called "MDI".
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
It says right there in the name it's for manipulation, not drawing/painting.
Neither was Photoshop, and it's in the name too, "photo". Photoshop was first programmed by a programmer who was an amateur photographer and wanted a way to edit photos.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
I used GIMP when I really wanted to move entirely to Ubuntu. But points 1, 2 and 6 broke GIMP for me. I hate sticking to XP just so I can have PS, but that's the price I have to pay to have proper photo editing.
If you're using Ubuntu have you tried CinePaint? I don't know if it meets your requirements but it may.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
Support for color modes other than greyscale and RGB, for one thing.
Those will come soon, and if you're not doing print or broadcast work, that isn't such a big deal.
Is that the same "come soon" as when 16 bit colour channels are "coming soon"? Ten years after 16 bit colour channels were offered GIMP still doesn't have it.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
You need a graphics tablet.
I've thought about getting a Bamboo tablet, and if Wacom makes a larger one I might get it. Outside a tablet, instead of a mouse you want a trackball. I've got two Logitech Trackman Wheel Opticals, one on my desk and the other in my laptop bag.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?
I am going to save you a lot of time and hassle and hate and headaches.
One word.
"point to focus"
Drink the kool-aid man, it's really good.
Something like Krita perhaps? That looks promising.
You apparently need a better window manager.
One that will auto-arrange windows in non-overlapping fashion for me, that will not put dialogs for tool parameters at random places when the screen is full, and that will remove all these redundant window borders that eat up screen estate, and that will let me resize 2 windows atr the same time when I resize the main image window ??? Or that it auto-focuses windows only if it's not one that depends on a random set of others ? (that is what happens to me, when I switch tools with mouse, I fly over another image window and it gets focus).
If you find it interfering with other app windows, put all your GIMP windows on a separate desktop.
This is pretty much a case for ... MDI! Just using windows and a virtual desktop.
Please, please, please no. The fewer of those created, the sooner we can abandon that broken stinking wreck of an interface concept called "MDI".
I feel that MDI is still see as the early attempts in Windows 3.11 where you have something like "internal windows". That part really sucks. true. But having all the tools etc. around the image in such a way that they never overlap, that you have no thick borders that eat up space, that you can move the split easily: yes, that is a much better alternative to what Gimp has, or even worse, what scribus has (with appearing/disappearing toolbox windows).
Useful book http://library.bpeer.com/movie/
BTW, you know that GIMP's "niche printing issues" would almost never bother a photographer, right?
Other than GIMP not being capable of more than 8 bits per colour channel, I don't know or recall about GIMP's "niche printing issues".
I really want to try CinePaint but I haven't found an online tutorial on using it, even CinePaint's online tutorial does not say how to use it. And unlike GIMP for which there are books, including the one being reviewed here, I haven't been able to find one for CinePaint. If you search Amazon books you get some results for it but they are about Linux and only mention CinePaint. Bookpool shows none. Searching Google for cinepiant books shows books on GIMP but not CinePaint.
Falcon
Should there be a Law?