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Why Most People Think Photoshop is Better than Gimp (And Why This is Not True.)

Gimp is a wonderful program that can truly do almost everything Photoshop can do (and the program is getting a big update early 2012 that will make it a lot better.)  So if Gimp is just as good as Photoshop, then why isn't the content shown online about the same?

To truly understand why finding good Gimp art is more difficult than finding good Photoshop art, you must first take a look at the respective communities.

A Little About Gimp

Gimp is an open-source program with a majority community of programmers, Open-Source lovers, and amateurs.  Therefore, the majority of the content made from gimp is what a programmer likes to do - make programs, and automated scripts that will create general Photo effects to a photo.  I have seen results from Gimp communities that are applauded by the Gimp community but would be completely detested by the Photoshop community.

A Little About Adobe Photoshop

Photoshop is a program with a majority community of professionals, and artists, simply because this is what program these people used when they went to college.  Therefore, the majority of the content made from Photoshop turns out to be beautiful works of art, and absolutely incredible pieces of work that often stuns and puts us in awe.  Photoshop content is a generally a reflection of what an artist likes to do - make beautiful art.
In conclusion, don't assume bad things of Gimp because of the content that you see online isn't as good as the Photoshop content you see online because it's not the program that creates the result, but the person telling the program what to do.

If you're looking for some beautiful Gimp art check out Griatch.  He does some incredible work with Gimp.
David Revoy also does some incredible work with nothing but open source software (including gimp.)

Related Posts:
3 great sources for learning how to use gimp for digital art.
4 tools every photo editor should know about.

 

Photo Study: Intensity by Max Vuong

In my personal opinion, I've never been one to "get" HDR for the most part.  I understand the process, and I have definitely seen some pretty cool HDR photos.  Unfortunately, this cool effect has now been emulated, repeated, and reused in so many places that I have become completely disgusted with the topic alltogether.  I believe that too many people aren't applying good Photo Editing Principal, and they're not taking photos to be HDR from the get-go, instead they're taking photos with blinders and later deciding "hey, I'm going to turn this photo into an HDR shot."

Of course, I'm generalizing an awful lot.  Don't get me wrong, as with any photo effect, I believe that HDR photography can be a beautiful thing as long as you are shooting for the edits, and practicing good Photo Editing Principles.

This photo is a prime example of what I mean by this.  Max Vuong took this shot with vision.  He knew exactly what he wanted the photo to look like before he ever took the photos.  There was little guesswork involved, instead his time was focused on gathering the ingredients needed to create his final photo.

Click here to view this photo on Flickr.

"Removing Your Photo-Editing Blinders - Shooting For the Edits" is one of my 5 exclusive gimp lessons, where I focus on teaching you how to beceome a good photo editor instead of teaching you how to use gimp.  You can sign up by visiting this page.

Photo Study: Road to Nowhere by Petera Oldeman

This photo is incredible.  The ominous feel that the fog and the color bring to the image just throw it over the top.  The curvy road makes the photo exciting.

If you can, try to imagine what this photo looked like before it's edits.  Now, try to think about when, where, and how the photo was taken.  Based on the shadows and the fog, it's pretty obvious this was taken early in the morning.  Odds are pretty good it was taken using a tripod or a monopod.
As I stare at the photo more, I ask myself "If I were to make the fog using GIMP, how would I do that?"  "How did they get that sepia tone?" and also "did they make exposure adjustments using gimp to bring out a bit of extra contrast in the grass and the road?  If so, what would be the best method of duplicating that in GIMP?  The curves tool?  an Overlay with a grayscale copy of the layer?"  There are several different ways to do the same thing, but all tools work a little differently.  You have to think about all of the possibilities.
This my friends, this is how you learn how to edit photos with Gimp.
The original photo can be seen here

Gimpday is near!

Neat! Mahvin drew this in Gimp for the upcoming #gimpday celebration. We're celebrating wilber's birthday on November 21'st - check out this page for more info on the celebrations: http://www.gimpchat.com/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=2548

How to learn gimp from photos

Earlier I talked a bit about how cool the post processing of the Harry Potter DVD art is. I figured I'd upload a video to show you guys what I'm talking about.

PS: the exclusive gimp tutorial videos I mention in the video can be obtained by subscribing here: http://eepurl.com/gECIH

Inspiration: Urban Decay Photography

One of my favorite things to edit using gimp are photos of urban decay and abandoned homes.  The haunting look that can be easily created from these images makes for a powerful image, and I always find looking at other people's photos to be very inspiring.

View the Haunted House Gimp Tutorial

view on flickr

view on flickr

view on flickr

view on flickr

More urban decay photos can be seen in this blog post

Inspiration: Underwater Dancing

This photo inspiration paper.li is really doing an awesome job finding good material for photo-editors.  This time around, we got our hands on a set of incredible underwater photos featuring people "dancing."  I'd venture to say this could be done with gimp using a few layer modes, combined with a reflection map if you wish to show the surface.

Gimp Photo Editing Inspiration: Infared Camera

I was running through my tweets on twitter yesterday and stumbled upon a great post by noupe with a Showcase of Infared Photography.

This lead to me doing a little digging on my own, and I stumbled on a few great images that gave me some very cool ideas for otherworldly Gimp photo edits by using the curves tool and some color adjustments.

View on Deviantart

 

View in DeviantArt

View in deviantart

One Awesome Gimp Addon

In my 5 photo-editing tips, I teach some principles of photo-editing that I fear some people miss out on. One of the biggest tips on that list talks about the importance of understanding and utilizing layers, and layer masks when editing a photo. There is a very handy gimp addon that can greatly improve your edits by giving you a massive selection of brushes, and must-have brush presets that can help your edits get a lot more character.

Here is an edit done by me using the various brushes from Gimp Paint Studio.

High Res Version in Flickr

 

Of course, I'm talking about Gimp Paint Studio.  Check out their page, and be sure to look at these two videos about Gimp Paint Studio:

Introduction:

Installing GPS (for all operating systems)