GIMP

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GIMP is an acronym for GNU Image Manipulation Program. It is a freely distributed program for such tasks as photo retouching, image composition and image authoring.

It has many capabilities. It can be used as a simple paint program, an expert quality photo retouching program, an online batch processing system, a mass production image renderer, an image format converter, etc.

GIMP is expandable and extensible. It is designed to be augmented with plug-ins and extensions to do just about anything. The advanced scripting interface allows everything from the simplest task to the most complex image manipulation procedures to be easily scripted.

GIMP is written and developed under X11 on UNIX platforms. But basically the same code also runs on MS Windows and Mac OS X.

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Ohloh Analysis Summary

Updated 09 Jul 2009 13:33 UTC

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4.2/5.0

Based on 523 user ratings.

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over 2 years ago Avatar
GIMP Lover

  by shakyone

(Updated 13MAY09)

I love digital photography, and I really like being able to do some advanced functions with digital images. I highly recommend GIMP to anyone willing to put a little effort into learning photo editing. If you are not willing to learn, stick to Google Picasa or even better, Microsoft Live Photo Gallery. GIMP is not dumbed down for the novice photographer that wants to be a hacker at photo editing. You do ... [More] have to do some homework to learn how to use it. Once you learn a few of the basics, it really starts to become a pleasure to use.

I mainly take pictures of my children, and when I get a good picture that I decide to print I like to clean it up for the large print format. I hate having some piece of food on their face, or a slightly off-color image. I felt cloning was a basic digital photo editing function, and hardly any basic photo editors have it as an available function. This still holds true today.

When I originally got into digital photography I had some evil software called Microsoft PictureIt!. It was a recent acquisition by MS, and a horrible product. I finally gave up. I was open to something better, however I was not in the mood to drop more cash on software that may or may not work out. An IT guy at work mentioned trying GIMP. He knew of it, though he didn't use it himself. Around 2003, I installed GIMP 2.01 on my PC, and abruptly got frustrated by the advanced interface. I gave it up for a month. I searched the web a little for tutorials, and I was rewarded. I finally linked to the GIMP basics tutorials from the www.gimp.org website, and I was rolling.

The GIMP website hosts most of those tutorials, and it links to more tutorials, to learn the basics of resizing, cropping, and cloning. Once these were mastered, I was ready to expand my skill set with more advanced functions. After some more time learning and doing, I read through the GIMP user Manual. I downloaded the PDF and I was impressed at how much of a well written document it is for the GIMP user. I found the software another increment more usable after that.

I bought a copy of Akkana Peck's GIMP book in 2008. It has brought me to my present day skill level. If you need a good book to get smarter on photo editing in general, and especially with the power of the GIMP, I recommend her most recent revision of the same book, ¨Beginning GIMP by Akkana Peck.¨ Edition 2 came out in January, it includes version GIMP 2.6. (http://www.amazon.com/Beginning-GIMP-Novice-Professional-Second/dp/1430210702/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1242267208&sr=8-1) It really unleashes the power of graphics editing with GIMP. Current GIMP learning books are few and far between. Her book really opened my eyes to what I could do with it. It addresses all levels of photo editing with GIMP, basic, intermediate and advanced.

Now I have learned most everything I wanted to get from photo editing, and I hardly scratch the surface of capabilities in the GIMP. Yet I continue to learn more, just to keep sharp and further improve my obsession. There is never a shortage of tutorials available from other users. I have enjoyed the images I created with it. My wife is extremely happy with how our pictures around the house look. I proved my ability enough to justify the move to the Digital SLR and the GIMP keeps up with the new gear just fine.

GIMP 2.6 has been out for a while now. It is stable, and fully functional.

GIMP 2.6 upgraded to 32-bit color depth. This was one of few features holding it back in 2007-2008 versus other software. The latest cameras use 14-bit color, and previously GIMP was only 8-bit.

Also, if you do not administrator rights on your computer, download the portable version from www.portableapps.com. You can install most plug-ins to this one as well. Not to mention you can run it from either a USB drive, or a folder in "My Documents." Enjoy.
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6 of 6 users found the following review helpful. Was this review helpful to you? |

about 1 year ago Avatar
GIMP is great for novices

    by Alison Heittman

I've been spreading the gospel of GIMP for years to novice website owners/updaters. GIMP is easy to obtain (providing your IT people don't block you!) and even easier to use. It contains the basics that are needed for quick and dirty image editing (resizing, cropping) for the web, and will keep an advanced user happy, too. GIMP is definitely a great complement to content management software, empowering anyone on a budget to be a more effective website manager.

1 of 2 users found the following review helpful. Was this review helpful to you? |

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    GIMP Animation Package 2.6.0 Released

    Posted about 1 month ago

    GAP 2.6.0 is a stable release of the video menu intended for use with the GIMP 2.6.x series.

    This release contains updates for video encoding/decoding, undo support for the storyboard feature and fixes for better compatibility with the GIMP ... [More] 2.6.x releases. Please have a look at the NEWS file included in the download for a detailed list of changes. [Less]

    Google Summer of Code - Student application period has started

    Posted 4 months ago

    Google has started to accept applications from students for Summer of Code.

    If you are interested in our proposals, then check if you meet Google's requirements; have a look at their advices and check what we want to read in your application.

    GIMP has been accepted for Google Summer of Code!

    Posted 4 months ago

    The the list of accepted organizations is published. This page is the main gateway for students to find the projects that they are looking for, and the guidelines of each org for successful applications.

    Check our wiki ideas page for suitbale projects, or propose your own ideas on our IRC channel and the gimp-developer mailing list.

    Google Summer of Code 2009

    Posted 4 months ago

    GIMP has applied to this year's Google Summer of Code.

    Currently we are waiting for the list of accepted organizations, due on March 18. We have suggestions for student projects at our wiki ideas page, but we are looking forward to see your own ideas, too. Join our IRC channel and the gimp-developer mailing list to discuss your proposals.

    Google Summer of Code 2009

    Posted 4 months ago

    GIMP has applied to this year's Google Summer of Code.

    Currently we are waiting for the list of accepted organizations, due on March 18. We have ideas for student projects at our wiki ideas page, but we are looking forward to see your own ideas, too. Join our IRC channel and the gimp-developer mailing list to discuss your ideas.

Read all GIMP articles…

Download Page
327 downloads
Homepage
http://www.gimp.org/
Licensed under
GNU General Public License 2.0 and GNU Lesser General Public License 2.1
Tagged as
Project Tags unix mac drawing gnome gtk2 raster gtk+ photo application design art raster-based image editor graphic tools graphics painting gtk linux windows osx | edit tags

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Codebase 682,446
Effort (est.) 188 Person Years
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$ 10,351,621

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