GIMP (
GNU Image Manipulation Program) is an brilliant
graphical editor that allows us to such tasks as image composition or photograph retouching with near professional results. The application with allow you to do whatever you want with you images: create
logos, retouch digital photographs, create animations,
photo enhancing, etc...
This application is the only alternative that is capable of competing with
Photoshop, that is
GNU licensed and completely free. Furthermore, the adaptation process to
GIMP for people who have used Photoshop is very simple, because it includes practically all the same tools and they are used in a very similar way.
Some of GIMPs main
features are:
-
Compatible with many formats: JPEG, PS, PSP, PNG, XPM, TIFF, TGA, MPEG, PS, PDF, PCX, BMP, PSD, ...
- Possibility to use
layers, layer masks, quickmask and full alpha channel support.
- Different types of
selection, including selection by color or magic wand.
- Image
transformation: duplicate, rotate, shear, scale, persepective, image modes (RGB, grey scales, indexing), etc..
- Image
adjustment: color balance, tone and saturation, colorize, brightness and contrast, threshold, levels, curves, desaturate,...
-
Filters: blur, enhance, distort, light and shadow, noise, edge-detect, generic, combinem artistic, decor, map, rendering, web, animation,..
If we take into account that
GIMP has seen some increadible improvements in the latest versions of the program, we can state without any doubt that it is one of the best graphical design applications available, on the same level as Photoshop, but with two major advantages over it: it is
free and hardly uses resources.