GIMP is hard.

[Exterous]

Yeah GIMP can be a PITA but I spent a lot of time in Photoshop back in the day so I have different ideas than they do about where things should be. Supposedly there is a Photoshop skin for it though. FWIW I was working with some guys at a University who are looking into replacement programs since Adobe is trying to screw them over with their new subscription model. I hear Paint.NET (Not MS Paint) works pretty well on a PC. It has some limitations (won't do RAWs) but its free and easier to use than GIMP. If its a Mac Affinity Photo has been doing well and I hear they have a PC version out not. Not free but cheaper than Photoshop

 

[ioni]

I have this task I am trying to do; essentially just pasting text on a picture so we can tweet them out (the text is just quotes from a filmmaker and they are longer than 140 characters). I did a quick and dirty one in MS Paint and thought it looked decent enough (took about 5 minutes), but then I tried to get fancy, so I installed GIMP

Using GIMP for that is like building a rocket ship to go to the grocery store. Just use Paint.NET next time.

 

[dullard]

GIMP is fantastic for photo post-processing. Getting the right colors, fixing blemishes, making obese people look thin, head swapping from one photo to another (for that person who looked good in one photo and terrible in the photo that everyone else looked good in), removing that car that drove behind your subject when you didn't expect it, etc. Just a couple extremely easy to do steps for those. Maybe it isn't as good as Photoshop, but free vs. extremely expensive makes GIMP the winner in my mind for those tasks.

But, GIMP royally sucks for content creation. Even simple creation of text to add to a photo is mind-numbingly difficult and extremely frustrating. Don't use GIMP if you are creating or adding things. Use just about any other program you have ever heard of for that.

 

[shortylickens]

GIMP is fantastic for photo post-processing. Getting the right colors, fixing blemishes, making obese people look thin, head swapping from one photo to another (for that person who looked good in one photo and terrible in the photo that everyone else looked good in), removing that car that drove behind your subject when you didn't expect it, etc. Just a couple extremely easy to do steps for those. Maybe it isn't as good as Photoshop, but free vs. extremely expensive makes GIMP the winner in my mind for those tasks.

But, GIMP royally sucks for content creation. Even simple creation of text to add to a photo is mind-numbingly difficult and extremely frustrating. Don't use GIMP if you are creating or adding things. Use just about any other program you have ever heard of for that.

I still use Corel because I learned it back in the Win95 days and I know how shit works. And if I cant do something in Paint, I can probably do it in Draw.

 

[MongGrel]

I've used GIMP in the past and stopped bothering with it.

There are other free things out there I'm more comfortable with, without relearning them.

Isn't a thing I'm overly worried about personally I suppose.

 

[nakedfrog]

GIMP is nothing like Photoshop. It's equally confusingly hard, but in a completely different direction.

Have fun - it's an awesome-powerful program if you put in the time.

Perfect summation. Sadly I've never put in the time with GIMP, so I always end up finding tutorials to help me out. When I was using Photoshop, I was using it at work, and I just don't do much image manipulation these days.

 

[WelshBloke]

This thread is not about what I thought that it was going to be about!

 

[shortylickens]

This thread is not about what I thought that it was going to be about!

http://static3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100330014229/zeropunctuation/images/b/bb/The_Saboteur_3.png

 

[Murloc]

Paint.NET is simple but has layers and transparency which really is everything you need to do the simple stuff.

I tried using Gimp back in the day and I just preferred photoshop. Nowadays I don't do any image manipulation at all.

 

[KeithTalent]

Using GIMP for that is like building a rocket ship to go to the grocery store. Just use Paint.NET next time.

Probably true (of course I did not know Paint.net existed) but I figured I may as well try and learn something new. I only needed something simple now, but I may need to do something more complicated in the future.

KT

 

[Scarpozzi]

I always liked the option of Gimp. I've used it for a lot of smaller tasks. When you consider the high price of Adobe (if you're legal), for me, Gimp is a great replacement product. If I really have editing needs, I'll hit up a friend, and have an expert save me a ton of time. They can do better work in 10 minutes than I can in a few hours.

 

[KeithTalent]

Yeah I figured if I got really strapped I could ask a nice person here to help me out for twenty bucks. I've seen the Photoshop threads; some talented peeps here.

KT

 

[gorcorps]

Try paint.net for a better than MS paint, but not as complicated as GIMP option. GIMP handles text better IMO as far as going back and editing it after the fact (assuming you layer it properly), but overall paint.net is easier to use for small projects... just limited.

 

[MongGrel]

I've learned to use some other free stuff various things over time I guess, I still use IrfanView for images I guess.

But I do not do a lot of image/video manipulation personally.

I'm just used to it, half the time I fire that up I forget how to use a few things.

What I use natively just to open simple pics at any rate.

Have other programs I use for other things I have gotten used to over time.

It is a bit of a mindset what you use of course, once you learn how a program helps you accomplish what you desire it to help you do, it's a bit hard to randomly wander into other areas.

I still like trying to keep to date, why I adopted Win 10 early and learned to use it.

 

[Eug]

I dislike GIMP.

If you don't like Photoshop and need to do some simple Photoshop-like stuff, another option is Photoshop Elements. It's not built for complete n00bs, but it's not built for pros either like Photoshop is. But, Photoshop Elements is not free.

 

[FeuerFrei]

I've made a lot of page titles with GiMP. I don't have a problem with the results. The process could be more simplistic though.
The text tool can be unintuitive. Text in GiMP has been kind of a backwater as far as developer attention goes.
I believe GiMP is currently soliciting funding, IIRC.

I've never used Photoshop so I have no conflicting user model in my head. And I for sure won't ever use Photoshop under a subscription plan. I hate that model. (unless my employer requires it, natch)

 

[dave_the_nerd]

I dislike GIMP.

If you don't like Photoshop and need to do some simple Photoshop-like stuff, another option is Photoshop Elements. It's not built for complete n00bs, but it's not built for pros either like Photoshop is. But, Photoshop Elements is not free.

Is Elements available on Linux? That's starting to become a consideration for me.

 

[shortylickens]

 

[Red Squirrel]

Haha Corel that brings back memories. I always thought it was odd that program could not produce red. It was some weird bug/design issue. You could get very close to red but never pure red.

 

[lxskllr]

I used gimp today to annotate a picture. I couldn't quickly find primitives for making small squares, so I was gonna use the pepper brush and insert green peppers instead :^D

Turned out I didn't really need the squares, so no peppers, but I should have used them anyway for the wtf factor :^D

edit:

:^P

 

[Ken g6]

This thread inspired me to write a little image annotation script:

#!/bin/bash
# Annotate an image with ImageMagick
height=`identify -verbose -ping -format "%[fx:w]" "$1"`
font_height=$(($height/15))
sw1=$(($height/800))
sw3=$(($height*3/800))
sw5=$(($height*5/800))
sw7=$(($height*7/800))
sw9=$(($height*9/800))
gravity="south"
if [[ "$4" != "" ]] ; then gravity="$4" ; fi
convert "$1" -gravity $gravity \
          -font "/usr/share/fonts/truetype/msttcorefonts/Arial_Black.ttf" -pointsize $font_height \
          -stroke '#0002' -strokewidth $sw9 -annotate 0 "$3" \
          -stroke '#0002' -strokewidth $sw7 -annotate 0 "$3" \
          -stroke '#0002' -strokewidth $sw5 -annotate 0 "$3" \
          -stroke '#0002' -strokewidth $sw3 -annotate 0 "$3" \
          -stroke '#0002' -strokewidth $sw1 -annotate 0 "$3" \
          -stroke  none   -fill white       -annotate 0 "$3" \
          "$2"

Usage: annotate.sh <inputfile> <outputfile> "Text for \nthe image" [gravity]

 

[FeuerFrei]

Deviantart is a great source of Gimp brushes.

 

[Dougrrr]

Agreed, I've given it a shot a few times but always find myself returning to Photoshop.

I have tried so hard to learn Gimp. I watched videos. Then I try it. Why does the Gimp I use look nothing like the videos? WTF! I revert to using PS7. I use it in Linux via WINE. No problems.

 

[Red Squirrel]

One of the big things I miss from when I was on photoshop is being able to easily apply attributes to layers. Outlines (great for text), shadows, 3D effects etc... In Gimp you need to do that manually which is a pain. You would think they would have added this feature by now.

 

[Stiff Clamp]

"GiMP is hard"

But . . . new Busch Light ® is easy! Because it's cold filtered to make it the easiest-drinking light beer around!