Post by Ashlee on Sept 7, 2010 19:45:26 GMT -5
Step One:
After you have your Base image selected you will open it up in GIMP software. There will be a bar on icons and layers on both the right and left side of your image. They are supposed to be there, not worries. We will mainly be using the left one, if you wish to minimize the right.
I like to start my manips with the eyes. It is always an easy want to dive into the photo and create great muse. To start you will want to zoom in, this can be changed at the bottom of you image. There is a small percent drop down menu. Try and blow it up to 400% -800%. You want the image to look really pixilated.
Sense we are just working on the eyes right now, you can more the image to either one eye or both. Personally, I like just one at a time.
Over in the left side toolbox, you will want to select you “Paths Tool” (highlighted in blue on image). You will then bring your curser over to the image and click all the way around the area you wish to be colored. Again, sense we are working on eyes you will click all around the eyes. While doing so you will notice you are placing little circles that are connected to one another; they are suppose to be there, no worries.
You will continue clicking around the eye until you complete a full circle, or eye like shape. Finish by clicking back on the first circle that you place on the Base image.
Once you have the image all clicked around and there are those linked circles in place you will bring your curser up to the top menu and click on ‘Select’ and bring your curser down to ‘From path’.
This will place marching ants, as I like to call them, around the eyes/area you wish to color.
The easiest way to color eyes is to use the drop down menu at the top that is titled ‘Colors’. In this drop down menu there are a lot of different ways to color or alter color in an image. Click on that menu and click on ‘Color Balance’.
This will bring up a window in which you can adjust the color balance of the area we have selected. You can move and play around with the three blue arrows on each of the scale to get a color that you find pleasing, or one that fits the design you drew up earlier for this manip.
Once you are happy with the color, click ‘OK’ to finish and close out of that window.
Now that we have the color done you can either stop, or call it finished. Or you can continue making adjustments. I like my eyes to look a lot like pools of water. I find them more interested with highlights and shadows. For this we use the dodge and burn tool.
Our eye is still selected with the ants; you will click on the ‘Dodge/Burn Tool’ (the image highlighted in blue on the toolbox). You will notice that it brought down a menu in the bottom half of the toolbox in regards to the item you selected. Make sure you have selected either dodge or burn.
You will then dodge the area you wish to have lighter and burn the area you wish to be darker. Play around with this for a bit. You will notice the more you click on one area the lighter or darker it will get. I like to add the shine at the top of the eyes and the dark closer to the upper part of the eye. Your style may be different.
After you are finished with Dodging and Burning, you will click on the top drop down menu ‘Select’ and then click on ‘None’. This will take away the marching ants from the eye we have just worked on. You will now repeat the steps above to the second eye.
After you have finished the second eye remember to select none, again. You can now zoom out of the image and see what it looks like at its normal size. If you like you can move on, if for some reason you want to fix it, start back from step one and edit what you feel is needed. You can always start over.
Remember to save your work under the GIMP file. The tag name for saving the file so you can work it again in GIMP is NOT .jpg or .png you want your file tag to end in a .xcf
