"Photoshop" for free

[Gary David Bouton]

I've found a program called GIMP (Gnu Image Manipulation Program) that is by far and a way closest to Photoshop. And it's free. IMO, it tops Photo-Paint, PaintShop Pro, and PhotoImpact for image manipulation (retouching).


http://www2.arnes.si/~sopjsimo/gimp/

You want to download the run-time and the program itself, the top two items on the list. The Mac is not supported but if you scrounge this site, UNIX is also supported.


My Best,
Gare

[Gary David Bouton]

Okay, I'm guilty of dissing Photo-Impact, but Gidgit, I've used Photo-Impact, as well as the latest version of Gimp. I make it a point to download demos to see where Photoshop might be ahead or behind, and I further confess that I started image editing with Aldus PhotoStyler, and then Photoshop when it became available in Windows flavor, so the old truth holds with me, too: you tend to stick with the app you started with (mostly to save a new learning curve).

Gimp struck me a truly useful app, one that requires a shorter learning curve than other image editors. To me, and this is just my oipinion and I've written several chapters in other people's books in the past, Photo-Paint for example, has a difficult interface to learn; it does not make the layout "sense" oif other apps.

Here's an example of ponying up concerning my statement about Gimp. Below are two pictures I melded to stop my nephew from ruining the first picture. I did this in Gimp, I have not read the documentation,m and it took about 15 minutes, 5 of them poking around for features.

Why did I just know that you'd contribute to this thread, Klaus?

Your comments about the look of an interface are valid to a certain extent, but hey, Maya, and particluarly SoftImage are butt-ugly, and somehow "true artists" seem to plod along begrudgingly and win academy awards using them.

Glad to see you back after four months.


My Best,

Gare

[Gaussian]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Dale Landry:
A good example, Gidgit's posts on this thread. What venom? What negativity? I don't see any of that in Gidgits's posts.
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
I totally agree Dale. I don't notice any venom or negativity.

[jens g.r. benthien]

I think I'm reading Linux between your lines Gary ;-}

Gimp is really a great app, on Linux it uses much less resource than on Win (any version).

However, on my win machine I'm still using Corel PhotoPaint 7 (LOL if you want), but for image editing, scaling, cropping, masks and the 1000+ PS plug-ins I've installed that's good enough. At least it's small, stable and fast.

BTW, there is an alternative: PhotoLine 32 -> http://www.pl32.com which is available for Win and Mac. Small, fast, beautiful, almost a clone of PS. A good deal for around US$ 100 I think. They used to have a minor bug - the algorithms for downscaling a pic, but I guess it's solved now.

I think I would prefer the GTK 2.21, but I have to check the compatibility with the Gimp for Windows.

jens g.r. benthien
designer
http://www.sacalobra.de

----------//--
If you don't know how to dream you'll never be a designer.
----------//--

[Gary David Bouton]

I've found a program called GIMP (Gnu Image Manipulation Program) that is by far and a way closest to Photoshop. And it's free. IMO, it tops Photo-Paint, PaintShop Pro, and PhotoImpact for image manipulation (retouching).


http://www2.arnes.si/~sopjsimo/gimp/

You want to download the run-time and the program itself, the top two items on the list. The Mac is not supported but if you scrounge this site, UNIX is also supported.


My Best,
Gare

[Klaus Nordby]

I tried Gimp some time ago, an earlier version I guess. It was just about the ugliest-looking app I had EVER seen, and was promptly deleted! I don't care about "many features" if the thing is unbearable to look at.

Ah, the joys of Adobe products - superior down to the very smallest detail, also looks-wise. True designers and artists just looooooove "good looks" - it's what makes our hearts pump!

K
www.klausnordby.com/xara (big how-to article)
www.xaraxone.com/FeaturedArt/kn/ (I was the first-ever featured artist in the Xone)
www.graphics.com (columnist, "The I of The Perceiver")

I tried the Gimp on another computer (may have been win 98 or ME or XP .,..cant recall). I didn't use it long as there were too many windows (for my liking), too many pop-up things, and my wacom pen wasn't working. It was said on the site ( at that time) that the windows version is generally not kept up to date as much as the other versions of it. All I can say is if someone likes it , that's great but I personally didn't like it much.

Part of my discomfort with the Gimp (at least my memory of the version I tried) was that it didn't have an interface I was happy with. I like a certain interface which PhotoImpact has had for years. Corel also has this (context sensitive settings bar depending on tool currently picked) as does XaraX. More programs are getting this including Photoshop's last version or two and even the new Painter8 will have it's current settings bar improved to be more like this style. Macromedias Mireworks MX also has this.

I'm sure it can do a lot and it's free so if someone uses it , that's great.

If there's a new windows version, I might check it out as I'm alsways trying out as many app demos as I can

[bmh216]

[Gary David Bouton]

Gidget...

This has become a hopelessly entangled morass of ill-will and antagonism. I'm sorry for my contribution to this negativity.

I'm not going to post anything more on this thread, except that everyone is entitled to their opinions, and Gimp is a free image editor that doesn't take too long to download.


Peace,

Gare

[Gary David Bouton]

I'd like to apologize for the initial comment I made about Gimp esseentially blowing away Photo-Impact, PSP, and Photo-Paint. I can and have used all these programs to get a feel for their feature set, and truth be known, PaintShop Pro has some pretty neat filters.

The reason I even brought up Gimp was because a friend of mine out in Hollywood told me that enterprises...production houses...are using Gimp because site licenses for 400 seats for Photoshop would kill a budget. My bud also tells me to watch Photoshop 8 closely, to see if we don't get an integrated workflow between video editing and image editing. Seems that a "secret" feature of the Unix version of Gimp (I think) enables you to cut, paste, and edit as a seamless workflow, so if for example, you needed to get rid of a traffic sign in a video, you'd clone it out using Gimp, instead of After Effects.

I'm sorry this thread got so empassioned, and I for one will zip it in the future if someone else wants to diss a post of mine. And by dissing, I mean a poorly-qualified opinion, such as, "Ew, it's ugly, it doesn't match the color of my scarf", or, "Brand X is better. It just is."


My Best,
Gare