GIMP re-visited

[overfifty]

For those of you who use GIMP on a regular basis do you freehand your "enhancements" with your mouse, or use something akin to a bamboo tablet and stylus. As much as I've used a PC, or laptop over the last twenty-five years the freehanding thing doesn't work for me. To avoid the frustration of working on that small screen in GIMP once I've got something remotely acceptable in black and white I find if I print off a copy and use a couple of thicknesses of felt pen the process goes  quicker. Comments? Thank you, Barry.

[EIEIO]

I tried the bamboo but could not get used to it and returned it to Amazon. I use the mouse pad on my laptop to do the touch-up on portraits. But there's a trick to making that work - if you want to draw a straight line, you click on one end, then hold the shift button down while moving to the 2nd point. shift-Left click at the 2nd point to get a straight line.

To do a smooth curve, make it as a series of short shift-Left click points. This comes out a lot better than freehand, and if you don't like a segment you can Control-Z to undo then re-do it.

Also with erasing the background, use the lasso tool. Click the starting point, then move the mouse and click again, then again, ... until you've surrounded the part you want to erase. Move the mouse around to close the lasso (click on the starting point) then hit Delete. For a portrait I usually start where the image touches the left edge of the frame then work right and up until I'm at the top of head, then straight up out of the frame, left, down, and close the lasso. Then Delete will clear the upper-left section of the image. Similar for the upper-right section to get to just the face (or whatever I'm rendering). 

[wombatie]

The program I used to have used to give me a great basis to start a pattern, then I would print it and them use black markers and white out to make my pattern it was a lot easier than using the Bamboo tablet that I brought.

Marg

[overfifty]

Thanks Ray. I think I've more or less got the hang of the basics, it's just a matter of refinement now. First job out of school was as a design draftsman. Surprisingly, it included courses focusing on shading. I have to learn to accept the premise with making portrait patterns that - for the most part - less is more.
    I'm using a photo of my granddaughter as a subject to work through the tutorials in SSV rather than J. Shatner. She has long hair  and is very proud of it. Lots of motivation to get it right, otherwise I'll never hear the end of it from all three generations!
    I like what you did with Alfred E. Newman where you used the grey infill and red borders. I'll pay particular attention to that part of the tutorial as I like the idea of the contrast between the red pattern outline and black blade.
     I'm going to play around with GIMP for a bit more and then start on Inkscape. Cheers, Barry.

[EIEIO]

that red and gray was done in Inkscape. Once you do the trace bitmap, select the trace and go to [object][fill and stroke]. set the fill to solid, intensity (bottom number) to 32 or 64 (light gray) and the stoke to full red (255 in the top number, all others set to zero). then save as svg or as png.

[overfifty]

So much for a grasp of the basics. If I try to alter my image through .../threshold or .../cartoon the image in the pop-up window doesn't register any change in contrast. That is the working image doesn't change shade at all (yes, I've ensured "preview" is checked, and the image is in greyscale). Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thank you, Barry.

[EIEIO]

Not sure if this is what you're seeing, but GIMP remembers the last area you worked on, so for example if you lasso (or oval, or rectangle) an area and delete it etc., it remembers that you were working on that area. If you now do any other operation like filter or threshhold, it will ONLY do that thing inside that lasso space (which may now be empty). To reset to edit the full image, select the rectangular selection tool and just click one point outside of that lasso space. BTW - this lasso selection is helpful if you have an original that maybe needs more contrast in only one part of the image. You can lasso that weak area then change brightness and contrast, etc., and it will only change the part inside the lasso (or oval or rectangle).

You can also get on another layer than the layer with your image. Then the new operations only work on that new layer. To reset to just one layer that includes the content of all layers, use [Image][Flatten image].

If you have deleted some area, like erasing the background using the lasso, and now see the checkerboard, then [Image][Flatten image] will fill in the erased area with the background color (defaulted to white).

Hope that's a help.

[overfifty]

It's _all_ very helpful. I noticed on one pattern you did on a couple that you moved the individuals closer together. Mind sharing? Thank you, Barry.

[EIEIO]

i usually try to edit the image before starting to render into a pattern. People are more interested in faces than clothes so I crop the picture to just include the faces and maybe some collar bone - makes the faces bigger in the cutting. Then erase the background. If the faces are not close together then use the GIMP lasso to surround one of the faces, ctrl-x (cut) then ctrl-v (paste). Make it a close lasso. At that point you can click on the surrounded face and drag it around the screen. Move it so it is close to the 2nd face or even overlapping the 2nd face by a little. It's like positioning people before taking the photo to get the best setting.

If you look at professional photos, they usually don't have people look directly at the camera - their face is turned to one side. They also don't have the flash blast into their faces - it causes bad contrast and bad shadows. So if you can, use a professional photo or stage the subject to get a 3/4 face and use sunlight or a light not mounted on the camera.

And always look for the reflected light in the eyeballs. Try to get that into the pattern. If only one eye has that reflection, add it to the other eye at about the same location. It makes a big difference in the portrait. If neither has it, you can experiment with adding some - I usually put it at the lower left of the iris for a person turned to their right (their oritentation). Note in the photo it will usually be a floater so you need to bridge it to outside the iris. Make the bridge about the same on both eyes.

[overfifty]

I thought I was on a roll with a portrait I was tweaking. I lassoed an area I wanted to delete rather than painting it out and now I can't get rid of this dotted line around the area.  [Control Z], [backspace] and [escape] don't cancel. The only place I can use the paintbrush is within the area I lassoed and deleted. Any suggestions would be very much appreciated as I don't want to start over if I don't have to (I like the results so far). Thank you, Barry.

[Malistar22]

I'm learning the program as well. It's not very intuitive if you ask me, but it's free and admittedly a very powerful tool. But I think I can answer this one. Click the select drop down menu and choose none. (Or Shift-Ctrl-A). Did that work?

[overfifty]

Guess I'm not very intuitive either... I lost it. Oh well, I'll start over - good practice. I'll certainly keep that in mind for next time. Thank you, Barry.

[overfifty]

I lied, the hockey game started and I wasn't paying attention to where I saved it. Yes, it worked - thank you. (Your my new best friend, sorry Ray.)

[Malistar22]

Really!? I'm you're new best friend!? That makes me happier than Carlton listening to Tom Jones!! 

[overfifty]

After seeing that I've re-considered (where's Ray?)