GIMP 2.2 Released

wongn writes "Several weeks since the splash screen contest was first announced, the latest milestone release for GIMP has come about - GIMP 2.2.0 has just been officially released. Only the linux binaries and source have yet appeared. From the website: 'The GIMP developers are proud to announce the availability of version 2.2.0 of the GNU Image Manipulation Program. About nine months after version 2.0 hit the road, we have completed another development cycle and can bring a new stable GIMP to our users' desktops.'"

Does it support

[Kickasso]

gimp-print 5.0.0 yet? Yeah it's beta but so what?

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[Anonymous Coward]

There is one feature that Photoshop has, that GIMP is seriously lacking.

A $650 price tag!

Seriously though, nobody is going to take The Gimp too seriously until it costs $650. High prices for software bring a placebo effect that simulates quality.

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[tiedemann]

Well, depends on the situation.
Me, I actually use GIMP sometimes because of it's excellent scripting functions.
Then, on the other hand, I usually use Photoshop or ImageReady when it comes to editing the files sent to me by the AD (I'm doing sites for a PR company).
I sure wish Photoshop had the same or similar scripting stuff that GIMP has though (no, droplets doesn't count since I can't edit them the same way).

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[Hatta]

If GIMP was not open source, would you use it?

No.

If linux wasn't open source, would I use it?

No.

If firefox wasn't open source, would I use it?

No.

If X wasn't open source, would I use it?

No.

I think you get the picture.

My problems with GIMP.

[dominion]

Overall, GIMP is an incredible feat of OSS, so I dno't want it to seem that I'm being completely negative.

But, there's two problems I have with GIMP, and one of them might have been fixed and one definitely hasn't.

First is the interface. Much has been said about it, but it really is not intuitive at all. A UI overhaul would be very helpful, and could go a long way to get a lot of Adobe enthusiasts to check it out. I've been using Mac OS X a lot lately, and it's really pointed out a lot of the really horrid UI decisions that have been made with Linux-grown software. The right-click menu is horribly unintuitive, there's too many options cluttered on one screen instead of giving them a heirarchy of use and seperating them by tabs or other methods. There's a whole bunch of things that could be done to make the the interface better, enough to fill a whole research document, so I'll leave it at that.

Second is the name. It needs to change. This is not about being PC, it's about reaching out to as many people as possible, and getting them to try out the GIMP. Will universities ever teach classes in a program that's called 'the gimp?' Will companies ever take seriously an employee who says that he wants to install 'the gimp' on his computer? Y'all have to have gotten the same weird looks as me when you've suggested that people try 'the gimp'. Have you ever told it to someone who uses a cane or crutches or is in a wheelchair?

If you have, you probably felt like a real jerk right after it slipped out of your mouth.

C'mon, change the name, we're not kids anymore, alright?

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[happyemoticon]

See http://www.cryptonomicon.com/beginning.html [cryptonomicon.com].

Seriously, do you think a perponderence of people even use the features that Photoshop has over Gimp? My department, for instance, bought two licenses for CS so that we could crop and size some photos, and do some very basic web graphics.

The boss turned down my suggestion, I think, because of the usual suspicion and fear that surrounds GNU software: "What? It can't be free. There must be some catch. It might even be illegal." The only downside that Gimp has is the annoyance of, "Oooh I don't like it the interface is all different" from my coworkers. But like they say, nobody ever got fired for buying (insert your favorite 800-lb gorilla corporation here).

Re:Hooray for dumbing down?

[Anonymous Coward]

Did you notice that (a) it's easier to click once than to type in a file name, and (b) you can give the list focus and type the name if you want? Sometimes simplicity and useability can come hand in hand.

don't sweat it, ya'll

[Anonymous Coward]

...just laugh that there's a big enough loser out there who feels the need to come to a website to post this. Seriously, imagine what this tool is probably like.

He probably is alone in his room, with no friends, sitting in front of a computer, making a difference in a society the only way he knows how, by trying to start shit on a website that is self-described "news for nerds." Wow. This is to you 'character assassin:' I feel sorry for you.

And I laugh at you, pinhead.

Re:My problems with GIMP.

[agent dero]

If you have, you probably felt like a real jerk right after it slipped out of your mouth.

C'mon, change the name, we're not kids anymore, alright?

Most of us know we're talking about an application if we ever mention "The GIMP" to a handicapped person, and are mature enough to handle it.

That's almost along the lines of getting nervous about talking about the civil rights movement with a black person.

Give me a break, we're not kids anymore, remember?

Re:My problems with GIMP.

[dominion]

civil rights movement with a black person.

The civil rights movement was a positive thing. The word 'gimp' is a negative slur. How are these related?

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[sahonen]

For that you should have bought Paint Shop Pro, though admittedly every version since 6.0 has been junk.

I hope someone makes a patch

[Quattro Vezina]

Anyone willing to make a patch for GIMP 2.2 that will replace the horrific new open and save dialogs with the old ones?

Please...the new ones are completely unusable.

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[csritchie]

"Seriously, do you think a perponderence of people even use the features that Photoshop has over Gimp?"

Yes, the _preponderance_ uses the features not found in the GIMP. This is mostly due to the fact the preponderance of people using the GIMP are not entry level web weenies in need of a better crop tool. The PS native format PSD files are standard for AE, Print design, 3D imports and exports. I can edit my PSD and have live updates posting out to my media work.

Photoshop isn't just the 800lbs gorilla for web, it's the 800lbs gorilla work _all_ media work.
It integrates with just about anything an artist needs to work with. From Greg Martin, to SKG, Photoshop's utilization goes far beyond web work and is flexible enough to accommodate the movie industry, the print industry, advertising, multimedia and web.

Ask any artist, if he can only have two tools to do all his work: video, print, advertising, tv, dv, web... It will be Photoshop and After Effects, hands down.

The GIMP is very good at what it does, but don't go jumping out of your /. jeans thinking you're an Art Director just yet ;)

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[darrylo]

As much as I like the gimp, it's seriously handicapped when it comes to even moderate digital camera photo processing, because it can only handle 8 bits per color channel (for the math-handicapped out there: "8 bits times 3 three color channels" is "24-bit color"). Good digital photo processing often needs at least 12 bits per channel (actually, to be "future proof", programs should probably suport at least 16-32 bits). In other words, moderate digital camera photo processing needs at least 48 bits per pixel, if not more.

(And, for the comprehension-impaired out there: "processing" is

not the same as "printing" or "displaying").

Unfortunately, this is one area where photoshop is significantly better than gimp. (And, yes, I do know about CinePaint, but it seems to be virtually dead.)

Re:Mac Version dissected

[Anonymous Coward]

Many of your criticism is based on the fact that GIMP runs in X11 and thusly does not have a native OS X front-end. I don't think it's really fair to criticise that aspect. Apple has to ensure a native-feeling X11 environment. The GIMP developers probably won't build a native version, it will be too time consuming.

Other parts of your critique arise from misinterpretation of the displayed screenshot.

I would say: download and install it and try for yourself

Tools, Dialogs, Filters: where to look?

[dankelley]

Don't get me wrong. I love having the gimp available for my work, at no cost. But there are aspects of the user experience that I think are flawed, needlessly.

My problem is that I do not use the gimp daily, and therefore I forget where things are hidden. But, surely, it needn't be so difficult to guess.

One thing I do a lot is to edit the contrast of an image that I've scanned. But, every time, I have to try a lot of menus to find that function. Image? Layers? Tools? Dialogs? Filters? All of these seem to be likely candidates. So, each and every time I want to adjust the contrast, I click each of these things, often a few times, missing the brightness/contrast function I'm looking for.

Does it really need to be this difficult?

I am not writing to suggest a reconfiguration of the menus -- folks have got used to the present state -- but rather to suggest something simpler. How about a menu action that stores recently chosen menus? In my case, a buffer of previously-selected menu items would contain just 3 items: "open", "brightness/contrast" and "save as". I imagine quite a few folks would have a small list of recent commands.

Q: is it technically feasible to store recently-used commands in this way? It would seem to be, since so many applications have recently-used file menu items.

Re:Hooray for dumbing down?

[EnronHaliburton2004]

It's also intuitive to RTFM or google when you don know the shortcut.

By definition, it's not intuitive if you need to RTFM just to use a basic function.

Re:Change the pronounciation

[HishamMuhammad]

Second is the name. It needs to change. This is not about being PC, it's about reaching out to as many people as possible, and getting them to try out the GIMP. Will universities ever teach classes in a program that's called 'the gimp?' Will companies ever take seriously an employee who says that he wants to install 'the gimp' on his computer? Y'all have to have gotten the same weird looks as me when you've suggested that people try 'the gimp'. Have you ever told it to someone who uses a cane or crutches or is in a wheelchair?

If you have, you probably felt like a real jerk right after it slipped out of your mouth.

Well, as a non-native speaker, I never knew the word "gimp" had a meaning in the English language. Just looked up m-w.com... gimp [m-w.com] means cripple [m-w.com], but it also means spirit [m-w.com] and, curiously, vim [m-w.com] (which is also a word!).

If you feel bad saying "gimp" as ['gimp], I suggest you to pronunce the "g" as in "ginger", making it ['jimp]. I've already heard people saying it like that; it's not that weird.

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[9mind]

I use gimp because 1) It runs on linux and windows (so I can use it anywhere 2) It seems to be faster accessing large RAW files than Photoshop 3) When I need to save in JPG or PNG is does a better job in compression, usually at better visual quality (Don't take my word for try it yourself) 4) I customize the perl scripts (soon pyhton as well) often to my taste, to get the output I want (which is alot harder in Photoshop) 5) Lastly pricetag! Photoshop is so overpriced it's insane! The only thing I find myself ever going back to Photoshop for is the text features and ability to do shadows, effects, bevels, etc on different layers.... that is much easier in Photoshop than Gimp.... Otherwise I would use GIMP over Photoshop anyday.

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[Cid Highwind]

Luckily, the GIMP is a useable program, and if you don't want to use PS, you probably don't have to, but that's not the issue. If PS is better for the job, even considering its price, it makes sense to use it.

It may be better for your job, but it has no bearing at all on mine. I'm not a professional artist. If you really need Photoshop, then spend the money and buy it. That's your perogative. For the rest of us, people who only need to color-correct digital photos or make a few icon sets for free software now and then, The GIMP is more than good enough. Just because you need a supercharged, nitromethane-fueled, 3000 horsepower graphics suite doesn't mean I do.

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[msevior]

I've never used Photoshop and I never will because I don't have $650 to spend on a photo retouching program. I'm amazed that so many people here on slashdot have paid $650 to touch up their digital photos which is basically all I use the GIMP for.

I mean professional graphic artists make up less than 1% of the population but judging from /. they're like 50% of the population.

So anyway, GIMP works fine for me. I have no idea about PS and suspect I never will.

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[grumbel]

Why would I use Gimp? Well, because there isn't much of an alternative on Linux, neither non-free or free. From the useability and feature point of view Gimp has enough problems that I wouldn't think to long to switch to a better alternative when it comes across, but so far its the best we have and its not that bad once you get used to it.

However since there are just two many things that Gimp won't address in the near future and since, unless I missed, something, there isn't another alternative on the horizon, I started my own, stil in its very very early baby steps:

http://flexlay.berlios.de/

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ask any artist, if he can only have two tools to do all his work:

My answer: A pencil and some paper.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[Anonymous Coward]

The GUI of GIMP is weak and nowhere near the refined professional GUI Photoshop had even in 1991. That's 15 years ... perhaps the guys leading the GIMP could learn from this. I used 2.x today on Mandrake and found it shameful. This is where open source fails ... usability. Why are the GUIs lacking so much?

Re:Hooray for dumbing down?

[Unknown Lamer]

Easy solution: Make the text box viewable in the box and make ctrl-l focus it.

It's still obvious that you can type the filename in if you'd like and you no longer have to use the mouse (unless you wish to) to make the text box have focus.

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[iroll]

"...so many people here on slashdot have paid $650..."

You aren't new here, so how could you say this with a straight face? Didn't you notice that two articles ago, /. reported on two major BitTorrent sites going down? I think regardless of how many slashbots "like" PS, only a few of them actually "paid" for it. I think we all know a guy who'll run us off a copy if we really needed it... (which I don't, so I use the GIMP).

CMYK

[BigBuckHunter]

CMYK... cmyk... CMYK... cmyk...

For the love of god!!!

$650 is nothing if it's faster

[SuperBanana]

The only reason Adobe charges so damn much is because they know a certain number of people will buy it regardless.

Sorry, I use photoshop quite often, and GIMP is, among other things, exceedingly slow; filters that take a second or two in Photoshop CS take a half minute in GIMP. I got tired of watching the filter progress bar all the time, and switched right back.

Professionals buy new $3k Macs when there's a new model out if there is even 2-3 seconds difference in how long a task takes. Why should they "save" $650 on something that will take them ten times as long?

Nevermind that macros in GIMP are a royal pain in the ass. In Photoshop, you just do the action while recording it, and Photoshop makes the macro for you. You can then apply the macro to images in the image browser instantly, control where things go, have a report generated on failures/successes, the whole nine yards.

If the GIMP team wants Photoshop market share(which I don't think they do), then repeat after me: productivity, productivity, productivity. They'd do well to sit down with a bunch of pros and write down everything they say, and weigh it very heavily into future plans.

Re:Mac Version dissected

[BenjyD]

Man, Mac users are a bitchy lot, aren't they. "Why haven't the developers of the GNU Image Manipulation Program spent their valuable development time making their program work on my non-Free platform?"

GIMP v competitors

[YrWrstNtmr]

I think GIMP compares more to PaintshopPro instead of Photoshop. GIMP and PSP are more of a very compenent second rank tool, with Photoshop being the first rank.

And for most peoples needs, GIMP or PSP is more than enough.

I'd guess that most of the people using Photoshop do so just because a) they got/pirated it for free, and b) it's popular. Pros use it because there is no viable alternative. And then there are the non-pro fools that actually shelled out all that money for it.

Oh noes, the interface is different!

[shish]

The "unintuitive interface" argument seems to apply in reverse as well, for me at least - I've been using the GIMP for several years, and recently ended up using photoshop because that's all our art dept had. I found the UI to be quite horrid; nothing was where I expected it to be, getting anything done was slow and painful, overall it just felt wrong - having seen things from the other side, I find it hard to take PS user's complaints about the GIMP seriously; I'd think it change that they (and I) don't like, not the new UI itself.

Done to death

[Craig Ringer]

While I can't really argue about the name, I think your UI criticisms are somewhat less valid.

Almost everybody I know with a problem with the GIMP's UI is an experienced photoshop user. I learned both apps at roughtly the same time, and find the GIMP 2.0's UI acceptably usable in comparison to that of Photoshop (on MacOS - the Windows photoshop UI makes the GIMP look like UI heven). I'm hardly one to claim it's perfect, but the GIMP 2.0's interface is IMO quite usable. (Lets just not talk about 1.x - ugh).

For those who want the GIMP to be Photoshop (not saying you're one of them) I think it would be valid to have a "photoshop user mode" for the GIMP, but in the end the GIMP is _not_ a photoshop clone, and the developers are trying to make a usable UI not clone the photoshop UI. I would also argue that there are better ways for them to spend their time than redoing the already working UI.

At least you don't seem to expect the app to just clone the Photoshop UI, which seems to be the most common expectation from folks who dislike the GIMP's UI. Seriously, Photoshop is not the be-all and end-all of user interface design - I find it cluttered and frustrating, though mostly due to the train wreck that is window management under MacOS. I find the Windows MDI version even worse. I think it's the best UI out there for a graphics app, but it's hardly perfect and it's severely limited by the braindead window management of major platforms.

For me personally, the real issue with the GIMP is technical limitations. The lack of CMYK support, colour management, and 48 bit colour means that for my personal needs - prepress photo manipulation - it's basically useless. Of course, that's only one small area in a very big field.

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[EchoMirage]

The only reason Adobe charges so damn much [for Photoshop] is because they know a certain number of people will buy it regardless.

Sorry, but this is a patently false argument. There's a lot of really incredible engineering and mathematics that has gone into Photoshop. Consider the optical kerning engine - simply the best typographical kerning mechanism ever invented. It analyzes the shape of every letter and determines on a per-character basis what degree of kerning is necessary to prevent collisions and preserve a consistent look. Brought to you by years of analytical geometry. Or consider the cloning brush - a tool in Photoshop that blends dischordant pieces of an image with its surroundings. Brought to you by lots of doctoral-level calculus. The list goes on.

The expertise that produces the engineering and math marvels found in Adobe products does not come cheap. You can criticize Adobe for spending too much on marketing or unnecessary litigation, but you can't claim that Adobe charges a lot of money "just because." They have a very high salary line in their annual budget, and the quality of their products reflects this.

Re:My Problem with the Gimp

[symbolic]

I have been using it for most of my image manipulation, but I often get frustrated, and here's why. Say you need to crop an image. You select the Crop tool, and click at the upper left corner of the cropped region, ready to drag a rectangle around the region of interest. Up pops a damn dialog that completely OBSCURES what you're doing! The same thing happens with the dropper tool. I was also reminded just yesterday that you cannot select more than one layer at time (say I want to move a group of objects), and worse, you have to keep moving back and forth between your image window and the Layers dialog, because pressing an arrow keey while the Layers dialog is active will change your selection. To add salt to the wound, the selection tool MUST be selected in order to nudge objects with the arrow keys. Why?

I like the Gimp - I think it has a lot to offer, and I use it when I can. Even though the interface is a lot nicer in 2.0, more work needs to be done.

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[Anonymous Coward]

Consider the optical kerning engine - simply the best typographical kerning mechanism ever invented.

And how does it compare to good ol' TeX?

Re:Seriously... Why would you use this?

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought he said "ask any artist..." and not "ask any digital image manipulator". After a brief check, it seems that I'm right. He DID say "ask any artist..."

you know what drawing is? Drawing is art.

Do you know what painting is? Painting is also art.

Do you know something? Sculpting is also art!

Along with paper folding (origami), music (well, alright, music except for hip-hop, RnB, trance, dance, and similar types), dancing, gymnastics, non-digital photography, architecture...

not one of those require a computer to be performed. Some of them are best performed without computers. Thus, you might note that art does not require a computer.

So, you might want to go see a proctologist, and have your head removed from your big fat arse.

Re:gentoo

[Anonymous Coward]

for it's package management system

"its".