Downloads
Get the GIMP
GIMP's official webpage -- you can find GIMP for any platform.GIMP 2.8.2 portable, for Windows -- by PortableApps.com.
Get an image viewer
It is strongly recommended that you use an image viewer. You can find quite a few for free. These programs are very helpful in viewing and managing image files -- and for many other everyday tasks as well. You can even find quite a few of them as portable. In the first video of this School, let me show for example how i am using an exellent free image viewer called XnView.
The version used in the videos is: GIMP 2.8
Although i will not remake the videos on every version release of GIMP -shame on me- you do not have to worry, since future releases will not be critically different on the basic functions, exactly those ones you are interested. Stay assured that we will focus on the job you want to do rather than on the tools you are going to use. ;-)
GIMP is a program used by many people, who know very well what they want out of image editing. It has an intuitive working environmant, that makes it right for professionals and amateurs alike. If you have already some experience with other image editing programs, your knowledge will help you in mastering GIMP faster - and in the same fashion learning GIMP might help you learn other image editors. You may at first consider image editing as a task rather independent of the specific program to use, and this School is very aware of this, my basic intention being to help you understand Digital Image as a subject matter.
GIMP is not only free but open source software, and you may find it in various places and versions and "forks". I strongly recommend to stick either to its webpage or download the files offered from the links above. As to the so-called "forks", i suggest that you rather stay away from them, and especially stay away from "GimpShop" because it is buggy. This was created with the intention of "transcribing" GIMP's interface so that it resembles Photoshop's so as to make it supposedly easier for Photoshop users. I suggest that you stick with the original and i bet that you will not regret.
GIMP is ideal for photography. It is a full power image editor, having all the typical tools that a photographer needs, amateur or professional, to get the work done in daily tasks. Retouching images, correcting visual defects and composition, color and tonal manipulation, on any digital image file created with any digital device, all these constitute normal tasks with the GIMP. Secondly, it is appropriate for drawing, that is making images which are made of geometrical shapes of any kind, like text and logos (despite not being the best, it does the job though, without the need for extra work with extra software). And thirdly, it is ideal for freehand drawing and painting and digital art, especially using a drawing tablet (digitizer). And of course, it makes it possible to work with all these kinds of data at the same time on the same image. You can actually use on the same project any data from your photocamera, your mobile phone, your tablet, your scanner, from the web, your drawing tablet. Your home computer is the means that makes you capable of expressing your creativity, your imagination being the only limit, having the techology at your fingertips and a free tool called GIMP.
Let us get down to some technical jargon, for a snapshot of GIMP's capabilities.
With GIMP, the image you work on is not just the image you see on the screen -- it is quite more than that. It is a project opening to you options and possibilities that have to do with every possible function on digital imaging. When you save your work, you save a project and not an image: a mould that is editable at anytime and from which you can produce usable images. A GIMP's file contains one or more images together with other important information about them: channels, transparencies, selections, masks, paths, useful stuff that may make your digital life more interesting.
It is extensible with plugins, scripts, macros, brushes, palettes, many resources being available on the web for free - or written by the smart programmer.
It is open source with anything that this may mean, and you are free to use it on any computer without any restriction or obligation.
You can save a project as an image together with its metadata, and send it to a partner as a complete work.
And still more, to be opened on a different platform. Windows users, Mac users, Linux users, all can work with the same files.
"Tile based memory management" means working with big files, the bottleneck being not the software (GIMP) but the hardware.
It makes the advanced user capable of controlling the working parameters like the memory used, the number of undos, the proccesor's cores etc.
It is ideal to work with two monitors. Professionals love this.
You can have the interface in your language - well, most probably.
You can have it as installed or as portable. You can be travelling away from home, enter an internet cafe or a friend's house, and just plug your USB thing in the computer and have it in front of you just like you have it at your home computer - with the same settings, brushes, pallettes and so on. It does not matter if that computer has GIMP or not, it just has to run Windows, and that is enough. You do not have to carry your own computer around - a relatively fast USB stick is just enough. It will run on any version of Windows from XP and up (as portable it only requires SP2 on XP, while as installed it requires SP3).
These features make this software really awesome. One thing only needs some attention: unicode paths. Like many other programs, GIMP does not love them. Not much worry though, the problem may be just a little inconvenience: you want to open a file but GIMP refuses, noting you that it just cannot. Just change paths to ANSI, and there you are, ready to enjoy the freedom of image editing at full power.
Diving in little by little
As a matter of fact, it is very probable that getting to know GIMP means that you get in contact with a kind of interface which might seem a bit unfamiliar to you at first. This happened in my case in the first place. If you are not proficient with using a computer, please take your time here and take the lesson in order from its beginning to its end, and you will soon feel happy to have done so. To be honest i do not know the people behind the GIMP, but i am convinced that they know what they are doing absolutely. After using GIMP for quite some time as a user who wants to get the work done, i find its working interface to be very intuitive and very well elaborated, oriented towards user-friendliness and productivity.
Choosing the interface language
GIMP's interface has been already translated in many languages. You can even set it to pick the system language automatically. When you have a portable GIMP, it is better to set the language explicitly, because this way you can be sure that you have it in your language at once in any computer you run it on (settings are stored in GIMP's folder and not in the computer's/user's folder).
Getting help
The command "Help" > "Help" brings you the application's help. But this will come up only if you have installed it locally, with an installer, after installing GIMP first. This Help also comes in a standalone HTML flavour. All these can be found in the GIMP's website. If the Help is not installed, the application will notify you. With the command "Edit" > "Preferences" > "Help system" you can define the Help's options: if it should open on the web or from your computer.
The command "Help" > "Context Help" adds a "question mark" to your mouse, and by clicking on any interface element (tool, dialog etc.) you instantly get the Help openned ready for you on the relative topic. Neat!
Opening files: "File > Open..."
The simple way. This command opens up a dialog which is rather typical and very easy to understand. Note that GIMP reports the relative keyboard shortcut at the side of the menu command (CTRL+O).
At the left, you can browse locations, to see folders/files. At the top a tree hierarchy helps navigation. You have quick access to the user's folder, the desktop, My Pictures, My Documents folders. You can choose what types of files to see, because GIMP opens many types of files. The dialog gives you even the recently opened files. By clicking on a filename, you see its icon, to help you identify the image. Note the tooltip on the icon: by clicking on the icon you refresh it. Below the icon you see the file size, the image size, the color space, the number of layers. You may CTRL+click filenames to select multiple files for opening. Finally, select file(s) and click "Open".
Opening files with drag&drop
After working with GIMP for a while, you will realize that this is the most efficient way to open files - the GIMP's way.
Dropping files on the GIMP's window
GIMP is quite versatile on opening files - and not only on that. If you drop a file not on the toolbox but on an opened image, it is added there as a new layer, and you can handle it in any way you want as we will see later.
Quick access to recently opened files
Starting a new image from scratch
Importing image data into the GIMP
There are quite a few simple and interesting ways to do that.
Exporting image data from GIMP
Copying image data from GIMP to use in other programs seems straightforward: just use the Copy command. But do not rest your case. There are interesting options on that.
"File" > "Open as Layers..."
A command to help you work fast importing data from multiple files. It has to do with layers, but i explain it here just to be consistent. The command fetches a dialog reminding the "Open..." dialog, where you may select multiple files with CTRL+click. The selected file(s) are opened as new layers on top of the existing layer(s) in your image - or as a new image in case you do not have one.
Single- and multiple-window modes
Concerning the appearance of windows and dialogs, GIMP's working interface cleverly enhances productivity by offering two modes. There are two important advantages on the GIMP's way:
- better management of your screen's real estate, and
- quickly reusing data between projects.
The Undo History
The Undo History is just one more dockable dialog. And a very useful one indeed, a valuable helper really.
Shortcuts, shortcuts, shortcuts...
Every decent application has shortcuts to help the user work faster by giving commands towards the machine with keyboard strokes. (More on that, shifting from the application level to the machine level, the advanced user can manage shortcuts through special software. In Windows for example, Autohotkey is such a piece of software.) GIMP gives you complete control to configure shortcuts on the application level. "Edit" > "Preferences" > "Interface" > "Configure Keyboard Shortcuts...". You can even choose to have your shortcuts for the current session or to save them permanently. Remember, in all dialogs you always have context help with a Help button down left. Perfect user-friendliness and intuition.
Note: You may ever find yourself in a situation where shortcuts do not seem to work inside a GIMP's session, if you change the input language (not interface language) to work with text at least once. GIMP is basically an image editor and it is recommended that you change input language only if you need to do so.
Working in Fullscreen
As said in theory, image editing is by default a demanding task in terms of detail and eye strain. GIMP tries to help you to respect your precious eyes by offering a nice fullscreen mode.
The Image Context Menu
One of the neatest things in GIMP's interface. All commands available anytime, anywhere, anyway.
The View menu
Now please open an image, and explore the commands of the View menu. The commands under the submenu "Zoom" are easy to understand. Notice the shortcuts at the side of every menu item as well. With "Revert zoom (nn%)" GIMP keeps track of your zoom level history and takes you at once to the previous zoom level just with a stroke on the [`] key. You can zoom in/out with [+]/[-]. With "View" > "Zoom" > "Fit Image in Window" [Shift+Ctrl+J] you make the image adopt to the window's size, while with "View" > "Shrink Wrap" [Ctrl+J] you make the window adopt to the image instead. You can go instantly to zoom level presets, probably the most useful shortcut there being the [1] for a 100% zoom level. With "View" > "Navigation Window" you get one more dockable dialog called "Navigation", which has six little buttons at its end: move your pointer there and take a look at the tooltips and you will immediately understand what they are for. When mouseovering the icon inside this "Navigation Window", CTRL+Wheel to see what happens! With 4 commands at the end of the "View" menu, you can show/hide the menubar, the rulers, the scrollbars, the statusbar.
Configuring the Toolbox
The good old Alt+Tab trick
I am tempted to remind this for the inexperienced user. If you work in multiple window mode, these windows respect the typical Alt+Tab rule as expected. Every image is effectively represented by its icon in the Alt+Tab temporary window, so that you instantly activate the image you want.
The canvas and positioning tools
The good old times, graphic artists used a drawing table on which they laid transparencies with optical elements. Nowadays we enjoy one more luxury of the digital era.
Zooming and panning
GIMP's interface offers effective ways and shortcuts to view and navigate with the least possible stress on your hands, according to your devices (mouse, drawing tablet, etc.) or taste.
Image properties and the statusbar
Accessing useful information about the image.
Multiple views
Another great feature of GIMP's interface.
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