Opinions on the use of GIMP - GNU Image Manipulator

[maddoc]

I used PS Elements for years exclusively since I only need to downsize, adjust levels and apply USM to my files of scanned BW film. Having switched to a Mac recently (unreliable PC hardware, especially in case of HP) I use GIMP now and like it better than PS Elements.

 

[charjohncarter]

Thank you all for your help and responses. I will look into Affinity and RawTherapee also.

Well, if you try RAWTherapee PM me and I'll give you my narrowed digital workflow to you to ease the learning curve. It really isn't a learning curve it is a understanding of what you don't need to use.

 

[mcfingon]

It's been years since I last attempted to work with GIMP. When last I went to use it, it did not have raw conversion capability, could not do anything more than an 8bit per component image, and had no notion of color spaces or color-managed-printing. I needed four or five other applications to make using GIMP useful. Never mind that the installation and configuration of GIMP was a multiple hour learning endeavor before you even started to work on the application itself.

For me, that was too limited and inefficient a solution to be worth putting the learning and time investment into.

I hope that subsequent versions of GIMP have improved on this situation, even though I doubt I'm going in that direction any time soon.

G

Gimp still doesn’t have raw conversion inbuilt, Godfrey, but it does have a plugin which is activated if you have Raw Therapee installed as well. That’s how it works on my Mac laptop anyway. It has colour spaces now, and 16 and 32-bit integer or floating bit precision. The only negative (excuse the pun) I can see is that if I change a curve in any of the bit levels the result shows a combing effect. I now do the curve work in Raw Therapee and export as 16-bit TIFF. I don’t know about the printing side as I don’t do any digital printing. It took me a while to get used to the different interfaces of these two programs, but I feel it has been well-spent time, compared to spending money with Adobe.
John Mc

 

[PRJ]

Does GIMP handle 16bit color yet?

Another option if you want free is Hasselblad's Phocus.

 

[tbhv55]

It really isn't a learning curve it is a understanding of what you don't need to use.

That's right. There's a lot of features in Rawtherapee which can be ignored. That stuff is mainly for unusual and/or complicated processing........ or, maybe it's there for inveterate geeks. 😉 😀

However, the 'everyday' stuff in RT does a very good job.

 

[NorpA]

I use darktable reducing to the min its tools. I use it for RAWs, but also for JPG.

 

[retinax]

I used Darktable a lot and the GIMP a bit when I did digital. With the inclusion of color spaces and 16 bit capabilities, GIMP is finally ready for serious use. What I missed in Darktable is dodge and burn tools. Does anyone know if I just overlooked them, or they have been added recently?

 

[Benjamin Marks]

For those of you using open source software, how do you manage RAW conversions for new cameras? For example, last year I got an Olympus OM-D, and needed the latest Adobe RAW software to use the camera's native files.

Also, how do you manage your screen drivers to produce a WYSIWYG image in Linux? I installed GIMP on a laptop as part of a Linux/Mint experiment. All my images looked posterized and dark. It was a profound user error on my part in terms of the program's settings on that particular laptop, but I never was able to figure out what I had done wrong. In contrast, PS and Lightroom just "work" -- or I have internalized their logic enough to get what I want out of them.

Please understand, I am not trashing the GIMP (or Linux, for that matter). I am just intimidated by the learning curve is all.

 

[NorpA]

I used Darktable a lot and the GIMP a bit when I did digital. With the inclusion of color spaces and 16 bit capabilities, GIMP is finally ready for serious use. What I missed in Darktable is dodge and burn tools. Does anyone know if I just overlooked them, or they have been added recently?

I believe you can achieve that result using masks and layers.
https://www.darktable.org/usermanual/en/drawn_mask.html


In regards to the question about Raw conversion, I calibrated my camera with a color checker. The converted RAW is much closer to the proprietary JPG, even if not the same.

 

[ray*j*gun]

Well, if you try RAWTherapee PM me and I'll give you my narrowed digital workflow to you to ease the learning curve. It really isn't a learning curve it is a understanding of what you don't need to use.

Thank you, I will!

 

[retinax]

I believe you can achieve that result using masks and layers.
https://www.darktable.org/usermanual/en/drawn_mask.html

Yeah I did that, just found it very cumbersome. But with more practice it could become fast enough.

 

[Godfrey]

Gimp still doesn’t have raw conversion inbuilt, Godfrey, but it does have a plugin which is activated if you have Raw Therapee installed as well. That’s how it works on my Mac laptop anyway. It has colour spaces now, and 16 and 32-bit integer or floating bit precision. The only negative (excuse the pun) I can see is that if I change a curve in any of the bit levels the result shows a combing effect. I now do the curve work in Raw Therapee and export as 16-bit TIFF. I don’t know about the printing side as I don’t do any digital printing. It took me a while to get used to the different interfaces of these two programs, but I feel it has been well-spent time, compared to spending money with Adobe.
John Mc

hmm. Well, RAWTherapee isn't my raw conversion tool of choice (Apple's own raw conversion engine does a better job IMO, and it's free on macOS and iOS). I don't consider a photograph "done" until I have a print of it on paper. So I suspect GIMP remains not for me.

Lightroom (now Lightroom Classic) does an excellent job and after trying two or three alternatives to LR 6.14, I found the best path for the moment was to upgrade to LrC and keep going until I come up with a better solution. At $10/month, it's not a financial burden although I hate paying a monthly for software use. I haven't used PS for years, and find the latest incarnations to be incredibly too complex for what I need now.

I'm fairly enthused by the combination of Phocus, Photos, and RAW Power. Phocus and Photos are both free and do excellent raw conversion, cross over the important boundaries (macOS->iOS->iPadOS) for me, and RAW Power is very reasonably priced and extends Photos capabilities. None of them do printing as well or in as sophisticated a manner as Lightroom Classic does, which is why I haven't entirely switched to them as yet.

I'm not about to switch to Linux (or Windows) any time soon. There would be little point to that for me: I'd need to reinvent hundreds of datastores and workflows that I've created and which work perfectly already. I don't only do photography on my computer: I do many, many other things as well. Moving all those other things is a much much bigger issue compared to moving my photographic work.

G

 

[NorpA]

Yeah I did that, just found it very cumbersome. But with more practice it could become fast enough.

Aurelien shows it nicely

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kzACn3l49HM


Frankly I never retouch my images at this point.
my modules usually are exposure, filmic and rotate/crop :/

minimalist approach.
Reason why I don't see Gimp for photography.