tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4698951195348751342024-03-25T02:17:35.156-06:00Gimparoo!Adapting Photoshop Tutorials for The GIMP.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.comBlogger37125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-27170823464882413272007-09-27T07:17:00.000-06:002007-09-27T07:19:27.754-06:00Old blog, just like the new blogAfter much deliberation, I've decided (finally) that I really do like Wordpress better. So, I'm not going to post new content here anymore. Please update your <a href="http://gimparoo.wordpress.com/feed/">feeds</a> and <a href="http://gimparoo.wordpress.com/">bookmarks</a>. Thank you.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com28tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-8546958049221237942007-08-08T18:20:00.001-06:002007-08-08T18:20:53.792-06:00Better Beveled TextIn the Script-Fu menu, there is an option to add a bevel, but I've found it to be lacking, so I found a better way to create a bevel which I'm sharing with you here.<br /><br />For this tutorial, I'll be using a 400x400 pixel image at 72 dpi.<br /><br />Okay, first you're going to need some text, so go ahead and select your font and color settings and put some letters on the canvas.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/1050921665/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1267/1050921665_4eef72c48b_o.jpg" alt="text_01" height="297" width="300" /></a><br /><br />Next, duplicate the text layer. Right click the new text layer, and select "Alpha to Selection". Then fill the selection with white. This will make your text invisible. Don't worry, it's still there. It's just white.<br /><br />Press Ctrl+Shift+A to deselect all. Now with the white text layer still selected, click Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/1050915635/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1309/1050915635_a42ef381c0_o.jpg" alt="blur_01" height="302" width="300" /></a><br /><br />You should now be able to see the edges of your color text peeking through the blurred area of the white layer.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/1050915677/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1004/1050915677_44fa1e86e9_o.jpg" alt="blur_02" height="297" width="300" /></a><br /><br />Select the original text layer (the one with color.) Go to Filter>Map>Bump Map. Make sure the blurred white text layer is selected in the first drop-down menu labeled "Bump Map" and that the map type is "Linear". You can get different effects with the other settings, so I encourage experimentation here. The only settings I changed in the rest of the options were elevation and depth. Everything else is default. Click Ok and watch the blue bar go across the bottom.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/1050915733/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1172/1050915733_5380f44979_o.jpg" alt="bump_map_01" height="292" width="301" /></a><br /><br />Once that's done, you are basically finished except the blurred white layer is still in the way. You can just hide it to make it go away, or if you wanted to, you could send it back behind the color layer, invert the color and use it as a drop shadow.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/1050915601/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1060/1050915619_9a9c3271a2_o.jpg" alt="Bevel Final" height="300" width="300" /><br /><em>(click to embiggen)</em></a><br /><br /><strong>Update: </strong><a href="http://ryanler.wordpress.com/" title="Ryan Lerch" target="_blank">Ryan</a> shows us <a href="http://ryanler.wordpress.com/2007/02/06/24/" title="3d text effect in Inkscape" target="_blank">how it's done</a> in <a href="http://inkscape.org" title="Inkscape homepage" target="_blank">Inkscape</a>.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com19tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-1532532343574762822007-04-18T05:55:00.000-06:002007-04-18T05:56:35.417-06:00Gimp Update<a href="http://www.gimp.org" title="The GIMP!" target="_blank">www.gimp.org</a> From the release:<br /><blockquote>Version 2.2.14 of the GNU Image Manipulation Program is a bug-fix release in the stable 2.2 series. Please see the <a href="http://developer.gimp.org/NEWS-2.2" title="Gimp News" target="_blank">NEWS</a> file for a detailed list of changes. The source code is available from <a href="http://gimp.org/downloads#mirrors" title="Download mirrors" target="_blank">ftp.gimp.org</a>. Binary packages for the various supported platforms should become available soon.</blockquote><br />I'll be waiting for it to hit the Ubuntu repo's, but if you don't mind building from source, have at it!Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com22tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-71051953511524655692007-04-08T10:59:00.001-06:002007-04-08T10:59:38.503-06:00Amazing CirclesFlickr user <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/flatfield/" title="flickr user profile" target="_blank">Flatfeild</a> has posted a great tutorial on how to make the popular <a href="http://www.flickr.com/groups/amazingcircles/" title="flickr group Amazing Circles" target="_blank">Amazing Circles</a> with gimp over at the GIMP Users flickr group. <a href="http://www.flickr.com/groups/gimpusers/discuss/72057594090582496/" title="Amazing Circles Tutorial" target="_blank">Head over and check it out</a>, and if you're a flickr user, please consider joining <a href="http://www.flickr.com/groups/gimpusers/" title="flickr group GIMP Users" target="_blank">the group</a>. <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/cottonijoe/108053846/" title="Amazing Circle" target="_blank">Here's an example</a> of an Amazing Circle.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com78tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-47608369329461710982007-03-28T12:26:00.000-06:002007-03-28T12:28:48.185-06:00ATI Driver UpdateAMD has posted an update to their proprietary Linux driver for ATI graphics cards. <a href="https://a248.e.akamai.net/f/674/9206/0/www2.ati.com/drivers/linux/linux_8.35.5.html" title="Release notes" target="_blank">Here is the announcement</a>. From the notes:<br /><blockquote><br /><h3><font color="#003c28" face="Verdana">Resolved Issues </font></h3><br /><a name="184285"></a> <font face="Verdana" size="2">The following section provide a brief description of resolved issues with the latest version of the AMD Catalyst™ Linux Graphics Driver software suite. These include:</font><br /><ul><br /> <li><a name="183763"></a> <font face="Verdana" size="2">The screen no longer turns black if the X-Server is terminated from the text console. This condition was known to occur only on certain laptop confgiurations. Further details can be found in topic number 737-26829.</font></li><br /></ul><br /></blockquote><br />This is very good news for those of us with these particular laptop configurations. Note: I have not yet installed this driver, as I just now saw the announcement, so I'd love to hear from anyone who's already installed it.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-26163004918472521142007-03-08T06:58:00.000-06:002007-03-08T07:02:46.913-06:00New Gimp ManualThe Gimp developers announced the release of a new users manual today. From the announcement: <blockquote>After three months of hard work we are proud to announce a new release of the user manual for GIMP 2.2.<br /><ul><li>New content (incl. spelling and grammar fixes) for German, French, Italian, Norwegian, Russian, Spanish and Korean</li><li>The PDF version of the manual is now generated using dblatex</li><li>Lots of bug fixes</li></ul></blockquote>. They recommend you wait until it's been prepackaged for your distribution before installing it on your system, but you can always check it out online at <a href="http://docs.gimp.org">http://docs.gimp.org</a>.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-74093937291398260952007-03-05T20:29:00.000-06:002007-03-05T20:45:04.096-06:00[H] On UbuntuI don't have any actual content for you right now, but I just saw this article, <a href="http://consumer.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTI5OCwxLCxoY29uc3VtZXI=">30 Days With Linux</a> that I thought I'd share. This is a very even handed review of my favorite linux distribution, <a href="http://ubuntu.com">Ubuntu</a>. <br /><br />The article is geared towards people who like to tinker with their machines but who aren't necessarily programmers or even script kiddies. (This group is also sometimes referred to as "power users" but that just sounds so lame... I shudder every time I hear it.) If you've been wondering if the time is right for a move toward linux, or if you're (rightly) upset about the price range or hardware requirements, or embedded DRM of Windows Vista, I'd highly recommend reading this article. The article is a bit long, so if you're short on time, you might just read the first and last pages. If you do have time, the article is well worth the read, even if you're already using linux.<br /><br />Enjoy.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com17tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-86874412562894011172007-03-02T13:45:00.000-06:002007-03-02T13:50:18.273-06:00Free Stock Photography<a href="http://www.adigitaldreamer.com/gallery/index.php">adigitaldreamer.com</a> has free royalty free stock photography available for download. This is a great resource for anyone wanting to build a website or magazine on the cheap. The stuff I've seen is pretty high quality, which is rare from a free stock photo site, so I thought they were worth a highlight. Go give them a look.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-26231747743282667482007-03-01T08:07:00.000-06:002007-03-02T13:51:14.234-06:00Open Font Library Logo CompetitionThe <a href="http://openfontlibrary.org/">Open Font Library</a> has announced a <a href="http://openfontlibrary.org/?ccm=/OFLBLogo">logo competition</a>. From the announcement: <blockquote>The Open Font Library (OFL.o) needs a logo to help identify the project. We want the community to help create this logo and three judges from the OFL.o will select the winning logo which we will use in all of our branding.</blockquote> One of the stipulations is that it must be in SVG format, so fire up <a href="http://inkscape.org/">Inkscape</a> and get cracking!Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-60032126078152966942007-02-27T22:42:00.000-06:002007-02-28T06:37:34.680-06:00Convert RGB to Black and WhiteThere is no one "right" way to convert color photographs from color to black and white. In fact there are tons of ways to do it, and they all have their advocates. If you want to see some other methods, I'd recommend taking a look at a tutorial at digital Photography School entitled <em><a href="http://digital-photography-school.com/blog/digital-black-and-white/">How to Convert Color Digital Images into Black and White Ones</a></em>, or at another one from GimpGuru.org entitled <em><a href="http://www.gimpguru.org/Tutorials/Color2BW/">Converting Color Images to B&W using the GIMP</a></em>. Both of these detail several different methods, all with their own merits.<br /><br />I've been researching the subject quite a bit, and I think I've settled on a favorite method of my own, and I'm going to detail it for you now. We'll be using lessons learned in the last couple of posts on luminosity masking, so if you haven't read those yet, you might want to at least <a href="http://gimparoo.blogspot.com/2007/02/luminosity-masking-dark-side.html">skim</a> <a href="http://gimparoo.blogspot.com/2007/02/luminosity-masking-light-side.html">them</a> to get the idea.<br /><br />The photograph for today is another <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/">CC licensed</a> shot, <a href="http://flickr.com/photos/jstar/170973096/">originally posted</a> to flickr by user <a href="http://flickr.com/photos/jstar/">J. Star</a>. Thank you J. for this truly amazing photograph.<br /><br />Okay, let's get on with it.<br /><ol><li>The first thing we're going to do is decompose to LAB to get the luminosity layer, so click Image>Mode>Decompose. Select LAB, make sure decompose to layers is checked, and click OK.<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/405248200/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/159/405248200_02ee377db2.jpg" width="325" height="446" alt="decompose" /></a><br />Discard the A and B layers, and just set that aside for a few minutes.</li><li>Go back to the <span style="font-weight: bold;">original color shot</span> and click Filters>Colors>Channel Mixer. Check both of the boxes for Monochrome and Preserve luminosity. <br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/405248198/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/125/405248198_dc124dfacf.jpg" width="340" height="500" alt="chan_mixer" /></a><br />You do not actually have to check the preserve luminosity box. What this box is <span style="font-style: italic;">supposed</span> to do is make the sliders dynamically adjust so they all add up to 100%. I have not found this to be the case, but maybe I'm just doing it wrong. If anyone can shed some light on that subject, I'd be very appreciative. I recommend checking it anyway just to be sure.</li><li>Step three is highly subjective, and will probably differ from image to image, so use your judgement here and pick values that look good to you. I'm picking Red - 70, Green - 25, and Blue - 5. I'm doing this because there's obviously a lot of red, not much green and very little blue in this photograph.<br /></li><li>You may at this point decide that you are finished. The channel mixer is a pretty powerful tool, and you can get very good results with it. I personally think the highlights on her back are a little too high, and the darkness on the back of his hand is a little too dark, so I'm going to use that luminosity layer to create some masks and adjust those areas a bit. Please see <a href="http://gimparoo.blogspot.com/2007/02/luminosity-masking-dark-side.html">Monday's post</a> on luminosity masking to get an idea on how to do that.<br /></li></ol>Here is the final result:<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/405248204/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/158/405248204_02f44d06d8.jpg" width="371" height="500" alt="Anniversary Redux" /></a> <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/405248202/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/148/405248202_59495bcb04.jpg" width="371" height="500" alt="Anniversary" /></a><br />I hope you've enjoyed this tutorial. Please remember there are many many ways to convert photographs from color to black and white, and I highly encourage you to research the subject to find your method of choice. Thank you for following along.<br /><br /><strong>Edit:</strong> I realize the EXIF data on the photograph says it was edited with Photoshop Elements 3.0. I assure you that was done by the original artist. All the work done in this tutorial is done in the Gimp.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-67339725411731246202007-02-27T09:08:00.000-06:002007-03-02T13:51:44.428-06:00Gimp Portable<a href="http://portableapps.com/">PortableApps.com</a> <a href="http://portableapps.com/news/2007-02-26_-_gimp_portable_2.2.13">announced yesterday</a> the release of their portable version of the Gimp 2.2.13. From the announcement: <blockquote>This new release updates the included GIMP to 2.2.13, adds Vista compatibility, correctly cleans up GTK's bookmark and thumbnail files and features a greatly improved startup speed thanks to the new launcher's plugin processing. And, it's now packaged in PortableApps.com Format so it can easily integrate with the <a href="http://portableapps.com/suite">PortableApps.com Suite</a>.</blockquote> If you don't have a portable computer, or if your only computer is someone elses, having PortableApps is the next best thing, seriously. <a href="http://portableapps.com/news/2007-02-26_-_gimp_portable_2.2.13">Go check it out</a>!Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-47725947971462491922007-02-26T10:25:00.001-06:002007-03-02T13:52:12.087-06:00Gimp Users flickr GroupJust bumped into the <a href="http://www.flickr.com/groups/gimpusers/">Gimp Users flickr group</a>. (Thanks again Charles.) From their description: <blockquote>Just to let the world know that some of us prefer to use "free software".</blockquote> They've got over 1,100 members in the group. <a href="http://www.flickr.com/groups/gimpusers/">Check them out</a>!Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-31498159841658872652007-02-26T08:27:00.000-06:002007-03-02T13:52:26.547-06:00LightZone for LinuxCharles Tilford (a.k.a. <a href="http://flickr.com/photos/charlestilford/">listentoreason</a>) sent me a tip about another photograph editor called <a href="http://lightzone.minimumeffort.net/index.html">LightZone for Linux</a>. I haven't had much time to experiment with it, but it looks to be a pretty sweet little package. This is $250 software on Windows or Macintosh but free for <strike>nerds</strike> linux users. Score! Here's a quote from <a href="http://www.lightcrafts.com/index.php">their homepage</a>: <blockquote>Drawing on principles behind the photographic Zone System and traditional darkroom film photography, LightZone 2.1 makes it simple and easy to bring out the true tone, color and contrast often hidden in digital images. Designed by photographers for photographers, LightZone 2.1 offers a rich set of powerful, yet easy to use digital editing tools. LightZone's editing tools help reduce the noise often found in high-ISO digital images, correct color shifts and white balance errors, selectively sharpen or blur images or parts of images, remove dust spots and boost overall color to create beautiful, breath-taking images, letting the true talent of the photographer shine though.</blockquote><br /><strong>Note:</strong> it's not open source, but it is free. Take that for what you will. I'll be checking it out sometime this week depending on my free time.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-19915687774565694192007-02-25T14:36:00.000-06:002007-02-25T12:36:54.977-06:00Luminosity Masking: The Dark SideOkay, last time I showed you how to bring out detail in highlighted areas. Today, I'm going to show you the opposite, bringing detail out of darkened areas. I'm also going to show you a different way of creating this luminosity mask that I think is a little more versatile. If you'd like to see the Photoshop way of doing things, the tutorial I'm adapting is from planetphotoshop.com and is called <a href="http://www.planetphotoshop.com/the-shadowy-face-of-the-luminosity-mask.html">The Shadowy Face of the Luminosity Mask</a>.<br /><br />The photograph for today is another <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/">CC licensed</a> photograph <a href="http://flickr.com/photos/charlestilford/189573628/">originally posted</a> by flickr user <a href="http://flickr.com/photos/charlestilford/">listentoreason</a>. Thanks Charles!<br /><br /><ol><li>Okay first, as always, open up your photograph in the Gimp and duplicate the background layer. Rename this layer Mask 1.</li><li>Just like last time, we're going to decompose the image into LAB layers by clicking Image>Mode>Decompose.<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/399839386/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/126/399839386_520e20efd5_o.jpg" alt="decompose_lab" height="432" width="301" /></a></li><li>Discard the A and B layers, then select all by pressing Ctrl-A and copy by pressing Ctrl-C.</li><li>Go back to your original color image, but this time, instead of creating a masking layer, we're going to use the quickmask by pressing Shift-Q. This will put a red overlay over the image. Press Ctrl-V to paste the copied Luminosity layer onto the quickmask and anchor the layer.<br /></li><li>Press Shift-Q again to toggle the quickmask off, and you should see the marching ants indicating a selection. If you look at the Selection Editor dialog, you'll see a black and white copy of your image that looks just like the Luminosity layer. White areas are fully selected, and black areas are fully deselected. So, right now, I've got almost all of the flower area selected along with some green leaves in the background.<br /></li><li>Press Ctrl-I to invert the selection, then press Ctrl-K to delete everything in the selection. Here's what my Mask 1 layer looks like now:<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/402255478/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/130/402255478_583b99fd61_o.jpg" width="500" height="432" alt="mask1" /></a><br /></li><li>Set Mask 1 layer blending mode to Multiply. The opacity is going to be subjective, so play around with yours, but I'm going to set mine to 57%.<br /></li><li>Now, Copy the background layer again, and merge the Mask 1 layer with the background copy and call it whatever you like. I'm calling it Layer 1.<br /></li><li>Now, you should still have a selection. Activate the background layer press Ctrl-C to copy the selection. Create a new transparent layer on top of Layer 1 and call it Mask 2. Press Ctrl-V to paste into the layer and anchor it. Here's what my Mask 2 layer looks like:<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/402255482/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/154/402255482_4a0de7a75a_o.jpg" width="500" height="432" alt="mask2" /></a></li><li>Now, set Mask 2 layer mode to Screen. Wow! Hello leaves. Now, you could decide that you're done at this point, but you might want to play with the curves dialog a bit to bump up those highlights even more.<br /></li></ol>That's it! Here's the before and after:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/402255465/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/171/402255465_38e0fa4a6e.jpg" width="500" height="375" alt="Pink Flower" /></a> <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/402255473/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/137/402255473_7573ade03a.jpg" width="500" height="375" alt="Pink Flower Redux" /></a><br /><br />I hope you've enjoyed this tutorial. Thanks for stopping by.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-26361787555756644242007-02-23T12:02:00.000-06:002007-02-23T10:02:34.026-06:00Luminosity Masking: The Light SideThis is part one of a two part series on luminosity masking. The original Photoshop tutorial can be found on <a href="http://www.planetphotoshop.com/" target="_blank">planetphotoshop.com</a> and is entitled: <a href="http://www.planetphotoshop.com/recovering-lost-highlight-detail.html" target="_blank">Recovering Lost Highlight Detail</a>, by Jim Patterson. Luminosity can be utilized for a great number of color and shade adjustments. Jim covers the basics, which should give you a good idea of the types of things you can do.<br /><br />Okay, onward. The image for today is another <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/">CC licensed</a> photograph found on flickr. It was <a href="http://flickr.com/photos/robadob/119514596/">originally posted</a> by flickr user <a href="http://flickr.com/photos/robadob/">robad0b</a>. Thanks! Please note that I don't actually think this photograph needs editing. I used it because it can highlight an extreme use of this technique. It is a very good photograph, and this technique is not going to make it better. It will however be good for illustrating the technique.<br /><br /><ol><li>Open your image, and make a copy of the background layer.</li><li>Click Image>Mode>Decompose. Select the LAB radio button, make sure the Decompose to layers checkbox is checked and click OK. <br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/399839386/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/126/399839386_520e20efd5_o.jpg" width="301" height="432" alt="decompose_lab" /></a><br />This will create a black and white copy of the photograph that probably looks pretty funky.<br /></li><li>In the layers dialog, you'll see 3 layers A, B and L. We only want the L (luminosity) layer, so you may discard the other two.</li><li>Select the entire layer (Ctrl-A) and copy it (Ctrl-C).</li><li>Go back to the original photograph. Right-click the background copy layer and select Add layer mask. Initialize it to white (full opacity) and click OK. Now, paste the copied luminosity layer from the decomposed version onto this mask (Ctrl-V). Anchor the layer by right-clicking the floating selection and selecting Anchor layer. You should now have a black and white thumbnail next to the color thumbnail in the background copy layer.<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/399839397/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/186/399839397_2cd84248e5_o.jpg" width="252" height="198" alt="layer_mask" /></a></li><li>Now, we don't want to affect the sky with our luminosity adjustments, so we're going to mask it out by painting black over it on the mask. Right click the Background copy layer, and select Show layer mask. Use a soft brush, and carefully go over the edges of the sky with black.<br /> Now you can either continue using the paintbrush, or use the freehand select tool to select the rest of the sky and fill it in with black.<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/399839393/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/183/399839393_ff618d7662_o.jpg" width="500" height="373" alt="edge_mask" /></a></li><li>The mask is now prepared, so on your layers dialog, right click the Background copy layer and select Apply layer mask. Here is what my masked layer looks like.<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/399839383/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/167/399839383_190be9c2e8_o.jpg" width="500" height="374" alt="applied_mask" /></a></li><li>Now for the adjustments. First thing, make sure Background copy layer is selected and change the layer mode to Multiply. Right away you will notice a big difference.</li><li>The next few steps are really subjective. Here's what I'm going to do. First I'll reduce the opacity of the Background copy layer to around 50%. Then I went to Layer>Colors>Curves and bumped up the Value just a bit. Now, the rocks are too dark, so I'm going to erase the rocks from the Background copy layer using the eraser tool.<br /></li></ol><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/399844606/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/130/399844606_747fc2452e.jpg" width="500" height="375" alt="virgin_snow" /></a> <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/399839389/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/145/399839389_e4917db1f9.jpg" width="500" height="375" alt="done" /></a> <br />Now, you'll notice the area below and to the right of the rocks has a bit more detail, and the shadows are much more defined. I hope you've enjoyed this tutorial adaptation. Next time we'll finish up with The Dark Side.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-9639731881411369912007-02-22T08:34:00.000-06:002007-02-22T08:37:36.113-06:00Excuses excuses...I have a couple of tutorials simmering, but I just can't dedicate the time they need right now. I've got two tests, today and tomorrow, and I need to focus. I promise this weekend I will have some content for you. Thanks for being patient.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-45616821335948547032007-02-20T08:22:00.000-06:002007-02-20T08:35:54.777-06:00Borked my partitionHey everyone. I thought I'd be cute and use a rearrange my partitions to give me more space for my linux partition, and I managed to completely kill my system. So, I'm spending the day recovering my files, reinstalling my OS and all my applications. Once I've got everything in place, I'll finish up the next tutorial and post it, but that might not be until tomorrow or the next day depending on how much free time I get.<br /><br /> I'll also probably be changing the layout here to try to pretend that I'm an actual website instead of a blog. My plan is to just make some backdated posts and then put links to them in the sidebar. Who knows, maybe one of these days Gimparoo will move to a commercial host. Maybe.<br /><br />Anyway, just wanted to give you all a heads-up. If you're looking for some Gimp related fun, you might check out the <a href="http://gug.sunsite.dk/" target="_blank">Gimp User Group (GUG)</a>. I've known about it for a long time, but just signed up as a member.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-14890915030060081382007-02-19T11:57:00.000-06:002007-03-02T13:52:54.437-06:00Open Source Photography (OSP)For all you shutterbugs out there, there's a flickr group out there just for you called <a href="http://www.flickr.com/groups/83823859@N00/">Open Source Photography (OSP)</a> I'll just post the summary they have up:<br /><br /><blockquote>This group deals with the usage of open source software to process photography. It intends to be a forum to share experiences and advances in the area of OSP. Image pos-processing using gimp, experiences with plug-ins, different open source for Tone mapping and HDRs, and much more … </blockquote><br /><br />That is all.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-84869809138323759622007-02-19T08:30:00.000-06:002007-02-19T16:20:55.244-06:00Inkscape: Web 2.0 ViolatorMy <a href="http://gimparoo.blogspot.com/2007/02/web-20-violators.html">very first tutorial</a> was an adaptation of a Photoshop tutorial on how to make one of those trendy violator badges. Well it turned out pretty ugly looking because the GFig plugin for the GIMP doesn't anti-alias the lines. Much discussion was had on whether or not I should include Inkscape tutorials on this blog to make up for the shortcomings of the GIMP, and I decided that I would give it a shot.<br /><br />Now, before I start, keep in mind that I am a total newbie at Inkscape, so there is probably an easier way to do the things I'm about to show you. By all means, please suggest improvements on the way I've done things here. Okay, enough weasling, on with the tutorial.<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393338201/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/161/393338201_48bcb73494_o.png" alt="ink.violator" height="200" width="200" /></a><br /><ol><br /><li>Open up Inkscape and set your document size to 200x200px. Set the X and Y grid spacing to 5px and make sure you've got grid snapping on. Press [5] to make the document fit the window size.</li><br /> <li>Click the stars and polygons button (or press [*]). Increase the number of corners to 12, and make sure the Polygon checkbox is unchecked. Set the spoke ratio to 0.830 and make sure Rounded and Randomized are set to 0.</li><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393348103/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/162/393348103_25d8c0f0e5_o.jpg" alt="star.props" height="43" width="656" /></a><br /> <li>Starting in the center of the drawing area, click and drag out to the 10px mark.</li><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393348098/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/142/393348098_4e22d69a0d_o.jpg" alt="first.star" height="421" width="422" /></a><br /> <li>Click Edit>Duplicate. You won't see a change, but you've actually got 2 shapes now. One on top of the other. Select the top shape and change it to whatever color you want your violator to be.</li><br /> <li>With the selection tool [F1] press and hold the [Alt] button and click the star shape. This will actually select the one on the bottom. You can tell because the color in the lower left will switch to black.</li><br /> <li>Click Object>Fill and stroke. Set the Blur to 3.5 and the Master opacity to 80.0%.</li><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393348096/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/122/393348096_c0b30416ed_o.jpg" alt="fill.stroke.1" height="470" width="325" /></a><br /> <li>Now select the colored shape and duplicate it again. Now, if you still have the fill and stroke dialog box open, change the color to white and click the radial gradient box.</li><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393348100/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/154/393348100_96d50bb014_o.jpg" alt="radial.fill" height="470" width="325" /></a><br /> <li>Now select the gradient tool [Ctrl]+[F1], and you'll see 3 handles that form a right angle in the center of the gradient. These control the position and size of the gradient. Grab the middle one and drag it to the upper-left portion of the shape. You can play with the other 2 handles to resize the gradient. I left it as-is.</li><br /> <li>Now select the text tool [F8] and click anywhere in the shape to start typing.</li><br /> <li>Using the selection tool, click twice until you see the handles on the corners change to indicate that it's in rotation mode and rotate the text however you want it. <strong>Note:</strong> You can create a shadow under the text the same way you did with the shadow for the shape.</li></ol><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393338201/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/161/393338201_48bcb73494_o.png" alt="ink.violator" height="200" width="200" /></a><br />That's it! Once you get the hang of how inkscape works, it really is easier to use for this sort of thing than the GIMP. I hope you've enjoyed this tutorial. Thanks for following along.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com29tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-34816230660082360862007-02-16T14:14:00.000-06:002007-02-17T11:39:49.093-06:00Basic Photo RetouchingToday I'm going to touch on some very simple yet extremely effective things you can do to make any photo look better. This is an adaptation of the <a href="http://www.worth1000.com/tutorial.asp?sid=161112">Photo Edit 101</a> tutorial done by Worth1000.com user <a href="http://www.worth1000.com/stories/stats.asp?uid=5088">Dallas_TX</a>.<br /><br />You can use these basic guidelines to enhance just about any photo. In the future, I'll use this post as a reference on what to do before starting whatever it is I'll be writing about that day. So, anyway, let's get started. Pick an image you want to enhance and open it up. I'll be using another <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/">CC licensed</a> image <a href="http://flickr.com/photos/munzer/136424903/">originally posted</a> by flickr user <a href="http://flickr.com/photos/munzer/">Munzerr</a>.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393026436/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/165/393026436_dd44a878e1_m.jpg" width="180" height="240" alt="Castle Before" /></a><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393026432/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/165/393026432_2eb986733a_m.jpg" width="180" height="240" alt="Castle Final" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Setting black and white points:</span><br />You will only need to do this step one time.<br /><ol><li>Click Tools>Color Tools>Levels...<br /></li><li>In the levels dialog, click the Channels dropdown and select the Red channel.</li><li>In the input levels, set the black level to 12 and the white level to 245.</li><li>Do the same thing for the green and blue channels, but leave the Value channel alone.<br /></li><li>Click on the Save button, and save these settings. Now, whenever you want to apply these settings, you can just click the Open button and open this file you've just created.</li></ol>Dallas gives a good explanation of why you would want to set the black and white points like that. I don't actually know if his explanation is correct or not, but it makes sense and the image certainly looks much better after applying the settings, so I'm not going to argue. Basically, what he's saying is that pure black and white don't actually contain any detail, so when you set the black and white points to <span style="font-weight: bold;">almost</span> black and <span style="font-weight: bold;">almost </span>white, you give the shades more detail. Like I said, I don't really understand the science of it, I just know it works.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">More black and white settings<span style="font-weight: bold;"> <span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /><br /></span></span></span>Now that we've told the program what our black and white limits are, let's pick out the darkest point and the lightest point in our image to define black and white for this picture.<br /><br /><ol><li>Click Layer>Colors>Threshold.</li><li>Grab the left-hand slider, and slide it all the way left to 0.</li><li>Slowly move the slider back to the right until some black spots start to appear. This is the darkest point on your picture. Remember this spot and click Cancel on the threshold dialog.<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393026437/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/147/393026437_b3fd577141_o.jpg" alt="black.point" height="335" width="300" /></a><br /></li><li>Open the Levels dialog back up and under the section for All channels, click the left-hand eyedropper and click in that darkest area of your picture.<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393032693/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/151/393032693_df4f6996f2.jpg" alt="levels" height="500" width="390" /></a><br /><br /></li></ol>Now, for the white point, you're going to do almost the exact same thing, except in the threshold dialog, after you drag the slider all the way to the left, you're going to manipulate the right-hand slider until things start to become visible. For me that was very quick. Remember that spot, cancel the threshold dialog. In the levels dialog, you're going to grab the right-hand eyedropper under the All channels section this time and click that whitest spot.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393027888/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/141/393027888_68d934cc70_o.jpg" alt="white.point" height="335" width="300" /></a><br /><br />At this point, you should already be looking very much better.<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393026436/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/165/393026436_dd44a878e1.jpg" alt="before" height="500" width="375" /></a><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393026429/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/176/393026429_7b18b52840.jpg" alt="after.colors" height="500" width="375" /></a><br />Now we're just going to push up the saturation ever so slightly. So click Layer>Colors>Hue-Saturation, and type some value between 5 and 15 into the saturation value. You will hardly notice a difference most likely, but it is there.<br /><br />Now we're going to sharpen a bit. Click Filters>Enhance>Unsharp Mask. This is a very misleading title for a very useful tool. Use very small values here. If you go too high, you'll start seeing a glow appear around your dark objects. I used a radius of 1.5. For amount, I used .50. Leave threshold at 0.<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393026444/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/136/393026444_a53a63f02f.jpg" alt="unsharp" height="430" width="337" /></a><br />Play around with these values until you find something you like. Just remember, go easy. Lower values are better.<br /><br />The next thing he mentions is straightening images. You can do this in images that have a horizon or other reference that should be horizontal. My image does not have that, so I'll just tell you how to do this in the GIMP. Pick out your reference, and drag a horizontal guide down until it touches the reference. Pick the rotate tool, and rotate the whole layer until the reference is parallel to the guide. Now, you'll notice the corners are transparent now. You'll just have to crop the image to remove the transparent areas.<br /><br />Okay, that's it. Let's take a look at the before and after images.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393026436/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/165/393026436_dd44a878e1.jpg" alt="before" height="500" width="375" /></a><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/393026432/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/165/393026432_2eb986733a.jpg" alt="after.sharp" height="500" width="375" /></a><br /><br />Pretty sweet!Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com48tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-39530915141772700362007-02-16T13:51:00.000-06:002007-03-02T13:53:20.996-06:00Inkscape .deb PackageFor those of you using some flavor of Debian linux (Ubuntu) and do not favor building your own packages, ubuntuforums.org user <a href="http://www.ubuntuforums.org/member.php?u=180150">gummybearchen<br /></a> has conveniently packaged Inkscape for us. Check it out here: <a href="http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=352561">http://www.ubuntuforums.org...</a>.<br /><br />That is all.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-651859633263943632007-02-15T17:07:00.000-06:002007-02-17T20:08:12.772-06:00Fake Tilt Shift<div style="background-color:#cccccc; padding:1em;">Note there are several updates to this entry at the bottom.</div><br /><br />Today's tutorial is an adaptation of Christopher Phin's <a href="http://recedinghairline.co.uk/tutorials/fakemodel/">Fake Model Photography</a> tutorial for Photoshop CS, and it's all about faking <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tilt_shift">tilt-shift</a> photography.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/391626313/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/142/391626313_705f1865e2.jpg" alt="Technicolor View redux" height="375" width="500" /></a><br /><br />I'll be using another <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/">CC licensed</a> photograph today. This one was <a href="http://flickr.com/photos/pietroizzo/87458709/">originally posted</a> by flickr user <a href="http://flickr.com/photos/pietroizzo/">pietroizzo</a>. Thank you very much!<br /><br />Okay, let's get started.<br /><ol><li>The most important part of this process is picking a good photo. There are basically 2 key components: aerial photography and strong lighting. You want this to look like you took the picture standing next to a model that's lit by a shop lamp.</li><li>Open your photo and create a new transparent layer named Mask.</li><li>Right click the new layer and select "Add layer mask"</li><li>Reset your colors by pressing the [d] key. You should have black as foreground and white as background now.<br /></li><li>Grab the gradient tool, select the FG to BG (RGB) gradient, and set the shape to Bi-linear.</li><li>Now pick out an imaginary focal point somewhere on your picture. When you take real closeup pictures of small objects with a nice camera, the focal point will be in sharp focus while the rest will be out of focus.<br /></li><li>Once you've got your focal point, click and drag the gradient in a vertical path starting from the focal point. It doesn't matter if it's perfect. This may take you a few tries to get just the way you want it. Note that you won't be able to see the gradient in your image, just in the mask thumbnail in the layers dialog.<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/391654900/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/181/391654900_40deff5e2b_o.jpg" alt="layer.mask" height="212" width="252" /></a><br /></li><li>Right click the Mask layer, and select "Mask to selection". Now you'll see some marching ants in a rectangle, but don't be deceived. The selection area indicated by the ants only indicates pixels that are more than 50% selected. If you take a look at the Selection Editor dialog, you'll see what the selection really looks like. (By the way, if anyone knows a better way to simulate Photoshop's quick mask, I'd love to hear it.)<br /></li><li>Activate the Background layer and click Filters>Blur>Gaussian blur. I used a 15 pixel radius, but you'll probably want to experiment with different levels of blur. Press [Ctrl]+[Shift]+[a] to deselect.<br /></li><li>Now for the color. Again, you'll probably want to experiment as the values in this step are highly subjective. Here's what I did: click Layer>Colors>Brightness-Contrast and bump the contrast up to 15. Then I bumped the color up a bit in the curves dialog (Layer>Colors>Curves).<br /></li></ol><br />Here's the before and after comparison:<br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/391626311/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/146/391626311_7f8baaece6.jpg" alt="Technicolor View" height="375" width="500" /></a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/391626313/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/142/391626313_705f1865e2.jpg" alt="Technicolor View redux" height="375" width="500" /></a><br /><br />That's pretty much it. I mentioned several times that you'll want to experiment, and I'll say it again. This isn't a formula so much as a guideline. The values for any of the above steps will need to be adjusted to taste for any photo, unless you pick this exact photo and you want it to look exactly like I made it look.<br /><br />I hope you've enjoyed this tutorial adaptation. Thank you for following along.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Update:</span> I realized after reading Alexanders comment that we could eliminate a couple of steps, so the article has been modified.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Update 2: </span>Commenter Achim has pointed out the <a href="http://sudakyo.hp.infoseek.co.jp/gimp/fblur/focusblur_e.html">Focus Blur</a> plugin made by Kyoichiro Suda. This really is a nice plugin, and I've been having fun with it today, but you must be using linux and you must have the libgimp2.0-dev package installed. For those reasons, I'm not going to include a tutorial for it because I think it's just too exclusionary. If you're savvy and you want a more powerful blur option, I highly recommend it.<br /><br />Here's the same photo blurred with the Focus Blur plugin:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/gimparoo/392251509/" title="Photo Sharing"><img src="http://farm1.static.flickr.com/167/392251509_f7757b61f9.jpg" width="500" height="375" alt="techni.rek.tsfb" /></a><br /><br /><strong>Update 3:</strong> I was looking through the keyboard shortcut options and found the Quickmask! It's [Shift]+[Q]. There is also a tiny little button in the lower-left corner of the image window that toggles the quickmask. I may do some short tutorials on its use in the future.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com132tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-23747051608882239502007-02-15T16:46:00.000-06:002007-02-15T16:47:39.721-06:00Post Coming SoonI know you are all probably ready for some new content by now, so I just wanted to let you know that I have a post cooking, I just haven't been able to perfect it yet. I've got to do some homework tonight, but I'll try to have it up in the next 24 hours. <br /><br />Hang tight!Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-19254461554970674302007-02-14T13:04:00.000-06:002007-02-14T13:47:09.786-06:00In the process of moving...I'm in the process of moving <a href="http://gimparoo.wordpress.com/">my blog</a> from wordpress to blogger. If you're looking for Gimparoo! content, please visit my old url for now: http://gimparoo.wordpress.com<br /><br /><strong>Update:</strong> All the posts from my old blog have been moved to this page. If you'd like to see the comments from those posts, I encourage you to go visit the old url, but please remember to leave new comments here on blogger. Thank you!<br /><br />I realize the template looks pretty sparse right now. I'll be working on that soon. I probably won't make any drastic changes except to widen the layout (does anyone really still use 800x600?) and maybe add a logo up top if I can come up with something. You may remember that I am completely not an artist, so that might be a challenge for me. Thank you for bearing with me during this transition. I promise to have new content soon!Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-469895119534875134.post-61895234873088071482007-02-14T08:41:00.000-06:002007-03-02T13:53:51.723-06:00Should I Include Inkscape?What I'm wondering is, should I include <a href="http://inkscape.org/" title="Inkscape homepage" target="_blank">Inkscape</a> as a tool for the tutorials on this blog? It's another open-source application which does vector paths a lot better than the GIMP's GFig plugin and I could make things like the Web 2.0 violators look a million times better. I'd still try to do everything here with the GIMP whenever possible, only using Inkscape when I felt it could accomplish the task in a way the GIMP could not.<br /><br />I don't know how to do one of the fancy polls, so just post a comment with your opinion please. Thank you.<br /><br /><strong>Update:</strong> It seems like the overwhelming majority would appreciate some Inkscape content. Havoc makes a very good point though. I'm a very busy guy. I'm a husband and a father. I have a full time job, and I am also taking a couple of courses at the local University. My time is Precious. However, one of the benifits of my job is that when things are going well, I can pretty much research and do what I please. I'm not terribly familiar with Inkscape, but since people (including myself) feel that it is a valuable addition, I will make an effort to include it when appropriate. After all, one of the reasons I started this project is to learn new things. So far, there's really only been one post where it would have made a difference in my opinion, so there may not be much call for it.<br /><br />Thank you everyone. I really appreciate the input.Scotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04862380608006889326noreply@blogger.com5