A look at GIMP 2.4

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Having recently upgraded my installation of Ubuntu to version 7.10, I was looking forward to testing out the GIMP 2.4 package in the repository. Version 2.4 brings several new features, including some which I think are important for skin and profile artists using GIMP.

The most obvious change in GIMP 2.4 is the interface. It's a subtle change, but certainly notable for me as soon as I launched the app. The icons in the tool box have been redone, and are a positive change. The new toolbox icons are for me quite clear as to the function of the tool they activate. I found the icon styling to be quite pleasant, neutral, and to the point. I liked the blue color scheme, but apparently there are others available as well.





Another change in the interface is what appears to be improved scaling of the tool options pane, which by default is docked below the toolbox itself. On my previous versions of GIMP on both Ubuntu and WinXP, I was particularly annoyed at how the tool options pane would require just a tiny amount of horizontal scrolling to see all of the controls or text. The only solution I found was to widen the toolbox window, which of course meant that it consumed more of my desktop workspace.


Now it seems that all of the toolbox option pane contents fit into the default width with no scrolling required. And this is accomplished without the pane becoming crowded. This really helps the usability in my opinion.





The next change is a big one for me... scalable brushes! Since the very first time I used GIMP I have lamented the fixed size brushes. The limitation of not being able to scale my brush up or down by just a small was very often a show stopper, sending me right back to Photoshop.


Now, there is a slider and accompanying numeric value box for controlling the scaling of the currently selected brush. The default value for a brush is 1.00 and has a minimum of 0.01, and a maximum value of 10.00. This range gives a useful range of scaling in my opinion. The screenshot below shows compares the minimum and maximum scaling values to the default brush size, with both a standard round hard in the top example, and a textured brush which I created. Size 10 with the texture brush was so large that it would not fit entirely within my canvas.





Finally, there is support for the Photoshop .abr brush format. I was able to import .abr brushes successfully, and scale them. They performed just as well as my own custom brushes in my playing with them.


The next change that I wanted to try out was selection resizing. A common issue I have is that I will create a round or oval selection around an image area, and the selection is not a perfect diameter match. Indeed, GIMP 2.4 allows such a selection to be resized, and provides a variety of tool options for constraining the scale. Also note that rounded corners can be added to selections.





Most impressively, I was able to modify selections made from stroking paths and freehand selections using ALL of the transform tools. These include scale, rotate, shear, skew, perspective, and horizontal and vertical flip. There are both dialog boxes for precise numeric input of modifications, and the free control handles are available as well.





Finally, there is fullscreen editing mode. Pressing F11 will scale the active image screen up to fill the screen and still allow editing. Of course this covers the toolboxs, but I could easily reach them with ALT-Tab. This is something I'd find quite uesful for working on large canvases, or when I'm applying details and I'm zoomed some, I would still have decent view of the surrounding image area.


In Ubuntu 7.10 I noticed a slight delay in the initial response of my Wacom pen when in fullscreen mode, but I must also admit that my Ubuntu desktop is running Compiz Fusion desktop effects, which doesn't like fullscreen mode applications. Maximizing the image window gave almost equivalent image area as fullscreen, and I didn't have any input delays.


Conclusion


There are more new features in GIMP 2.4 that what I've listed here, quite a few in fact. Many of them are more related to photo editing, than painting though. What I've covered here are the features which will directly change the way I work in GIMP. And in my opinion these are positive changes on all counts.


There are still some issues I have with GIMP, most notably the brush smoothness and feathering quality. But on the whole this step forward is significant in allowing me to work in GIMP more comfortably as an alternative to Photoshop.