Posts Tagged ‘simple steps’

Make picture transparent with the Gimp on Linux

Tuesday, November 16th, 2010

GIMP Logo make picture transparent with GIMP on GNU / Linux
I’m trying to learn some basic design this days as an attempt to fill my huge missing gap of knowledge in graphic processing.
I’ve always been not too good with visual stuff and always been focused on the command line and console, however since
some time design started being quite interesting thing to me and I found it quite handy and challenging to learn some basic designing.

I’m not really a Windows guy and thus my Photoshop skills are next to zero.
Since The Gimp is the substitute for Photoshopfor Linux users and I had a task for one of the websites I’m developing to make some pictures for the website transparent, therefore I had to learn how to make pictures transparent with The Gimp
After some reading online and some experimenting with GIMP it appeared to me it’s very easy to actually make pictures transparent with the GIMP.
So I’ve come with a small article here on how to make image or a picture transparent with Gimp in simple steps in order to help people who are trying to achieve the same easy task:

1. Open Gimp and place your mouse cursor on the picture

Here, Press the 2nd or 3rd mouse button to show menu.

2. Select Layer -> Transperancy -> Alpha to Selection

In that menu select Select Layer -> Transprerancy -> Alpha to Selection

Gimp Alpha to Selection Menu

3. Use Fuzzy Select Tool and select the picture background

Gimp fuzzy select background

4. From Gimp Window pane main menu choose the Clear option

Edit -> Clear (Delete)
gimp edit clear menu

That’s all now your picture background should be removed if some parts of the picture still needs to be purged just follow the above step and remove them.
I should say I thought making picture transparent with GIMP would be a more complex task than it really was, quite nice one more step in my development as a designer 🙂

How to add extra plugins, effects, brushes and functionality to GIMP on GNU / Linux

Tuesday, February 28th, 2012

How to add extra plugins, effects brushes and functionality to GIMP on Debian and Ubuntu Linux / GIMP logo head pictureThese days, I'm playing with The GIMP. I've been a GNU / Linux, FreeBSD user for already 11 years now but as I'm doing mostly system administration and I don't have much expertise in Panting or Computer Graphical Design, I've never put much time to learn more in the interesting area of graphical design. Hence until just recently, Just until now, I've never spend time with the GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program) and never realized how powerful this great program is. The more I learn about GIMP functionalities and how it works the more it makes me determined to learn some basic web design 🙂

The functionality which The GIMP offers in a basic install is quite rich, however by default on most Debian and Ubuntu installations many of the great plugins which easifies the way to edit pictures is missing.

Example for a very valuable functionality which is not present with standard gimp package installed on Debian and Ubuntu are:
 

Here I will mention here few words on:

  • GIMP FX-Foundry Collection

GIMP FX-Foundry is a thoroughful collection of GIMP scripts (addon plugins), that automates many of the operations which requires a professional web design skills and gives an easy intuitive interface through which very robust "high level" graphic design can be accomplished. This additional GIMP extensions helps to create very unique design in just few simple steps, as well as gives multiple tools for the sake of easy pro design creation. For anyone looking for quick edit of images with GIMP FX-Foundry is a must have GIMP plugins extension. The script pack is located on http://gimpfx-foundry.sourceforge.net/

To install FX-Foundry scripts collection on Debian / Ubuntu / Linux Mint and other based Linux distributions:

debian:~# apt-get install --yes gimp-plugin-registry
...

gimp-plugin-registry package name is based on GIMP Plugin registry's website
. Gimp plugin registry contains many helpful design goodies 🙂

Once installed you will notice GIMP with a new menu on the main menus bar reading FX-Foundry :

GIMP Screenshot GNU Linux Debian additional FX Foundry menu

GIMP FX Foundry extensionos package contains 124 scripts for additional graphics manipulation. The collection contains less scripts than the ones provided by gimp-plugin-registry. package has 156 scripts inside.

One of the most helpful GIMP addition from the package is the inclusion of Save for Web button under:

File -> Save for Web

GIMP Save for Web menu suitable for reduced size images for HTML image producing on Debian GNU / Linux screenshot

Another very helpful .deb package which adds up to GIMP's design possibilities is gimp-data-extras .

gimp-data-extras adds 111 new GIMP Fill in Patterns , which can be used through the Blend Tool to Fill selected areas with color gradients.

To install gimp-data-extras on Debian:

debian:~# apt-get install --yes gimp-data-extras
...

Generally once installed this package will add to GIMP – an extra set of brushes, palettes, and gradients for The GIMP as you can read in the package description.

I was also quite stunned to find out the good old GIMP is capable of basic Video editting!!

On Debian and Ubuntu there is a package called gimp-gap which once installed adds an extra Video menu.

GIMP Screenshot GNU Debian linux adding GIMP extra Video editting capabilities

I've not tested the GIMP video editting capabilities yet, however I intend to learn something about it immediately when I have some free time left. You see the enormous list of Video editting possibilities GIMP obtaines with gimp-gap which btw stands for (The GIMP Animation Package).

To install gimp-gap:

debian:~# apt-get install --yes gimp-gap

I've noticed also the following list of others useful GIMP additions (mainly helpful in Web, Brochure and Logo Graphic Design) to install them:

debian:~# apt-get --yes install gimp-gmic gimp-ufraw gtkam-gimp gimp-gluas \gimp-dimage-color gimp-dds gimp-dcraw gimp-cbmplugs flegita-gimp gimp-texturize \gimp-resynthesizer gimp-lensfun gimp-gutenprint gtkam-gimp mrwtoppm-gimp

Here is the package description of the packages above command will install:

  • gimp-cbmplugs – plugins for The GIMP to import/export Commodore 64 files
  • gimp-data-extras – An extra set of brushes, palettes, and gradients for The GIMP
  • gimp-dcraw – GIMP plug-in for loading RAW digital photos
  • gimp-dds – DDS (DirectDraw Surface) plugin for the gimp
  • gimp-dimage-color – GIMP plugin to convert Minolta DiMAGE pictures to sRGB colour space
  • gimp-gap – The GIMP Animation Package
  • gimp-gluas – Lua environment plug-in for GIMP
  • gimp-gmic – GIMP plugin for GREYC's Magic Image Converter
  • gimp-gutenprint – print plugin for the GIMP
  • gimp-lensfun – Gimp plugin to correct lens distortion using the lensfun library
  • gimp-normalmap – Normal map plugin for GIMP
  • gimp-plugin-registry – repository of optional extensions for GIMP
  • gimp-resynthesizer – Gimp plugin for texture synthesis
  • gimp-texturize – generates large textures from a small sample
  • gimp-ufraw – gimp importer for raw camera images
  • flegita-gimp – Gnome Gimp scan plugin.
  • gtkam-gimp – gtkam gimp plugin to open digital camera pictures
  • mrwtoppm-gimp – GIMP-plugin to support Minolta DiMAGE 5/7/7i RAW images

Now after installing all this plugins and seeing all GIMP's power, I'm starting to wonder why are still people ranting Adobe PhotoShop is feature rich.
That's all, enjoy the great new GIMP features. Happy picture editting 😉

How to make GNOME 3 Desktop icons to work as in GNOME 2 on Debian GNU / Linux

Saturday, February 4th, 2012

If you're using Debian GNU/Linux wheezy/sid, you have already figured out GNOME3 settings to start GNOME in Classic mode (like in GNOME 2), starts gnome in a mode where the desktop is not showing the usual Computer, Home, Trash etc.

Besides that in that strange back-compitability Classic GNOME mode its impossible to add any program as a link in desktop like in the good old GNOME 2.

Thanksfully this abusive behaviour of the backwards compitability mode is easily fixable by two simple steps, here they are:

1. Install gnome-tweak-tool – (Tool to adjust advanced configuration settings for GNOME

root@debian:~# apt-get install gnome-tweak-tool

2. Start gnome-tweak tool

Press ALT+F2 and run gnome-tweak-tool or run it via xterm / gnome-terminal:

moonman@Moon:~$ gnome-tweak-tool

Change in Desktop, Have file manager handle the desktop the settings to ON

gnome-tweek-tool Debian GNU Linux wheezy sid screenshot

gnome-tweak-tool Debian wheezy/Sid GNU Linux screenshot handle desktop on

Once the Screenshot Handle Desktop is set to ON, further drag and dropping any application to the Desktop will be working.
Something really irritating is that launching applications in GNOME 3 does not work properly if you just press ALT+F2 and type in lets say gnome-terminal , to work around this weirdity you will have to install gnome-shell package.