Tutorial: Resizing Images with the GIMP!

[Brother_Bliss]

What is GIMP?

GIMP stands for GNU Image Manipulation Program. It is a freely distributed piece of software for such tasks as photo retouching, image composition and image authoring. It works on many operating systems, in many languages. You can download the latest version of GIMP and read more information at www.gimp.org

At the time of authoring this message, GIMP 2.6 was the current version.

How do I open an image in GIMP?

After installing the software, you may have chosen to have an icon placed on your desktop.

You can open GIMP by clicking the icon, or if you did not have an icon placed on your desktop during installation, you will need to look for it in your start menu or Program Files directory.

Once the program has opened, you can can go to the File menu at the top of the screen and then click Open from the drop down menu.

A pop up will appear and from within it you must navigate to the picture you want to open, wherever it may be on your computer.

Is there an easier way to open a picture in GIMP?

Well, yes. You could navigate to the picture first using Windows Explorer (just click My Documents or something), and then when you find the image, right-click the image and choose Open With and select GIMP.

Now whichever way you chose to go, the picture should now be opened in GIMP...

So now how do I reduce the size of the image?

From the Image menu, select Scale Image from the drop down menu...

Then enter the dimensions you want the picture to be. If this is for a post here at JWTalk, please reduce the size of the pic to no more than 600x600 pixels. Leave the dots per inch value at 72dpi, as this is the standard for web pages. If this is for an Avatar image, then reduce to at least 125x125.

All done! How do I save my work?

From the File menu, select Save As from the drop down menu.

Then give your new image a name, decide where you want to save it on your computer, and choose the proper file type.

After clicking Save, you will probably get a stupid pop-up box that looks like this...

Just play along. Export it, and then Save it in the next pop-up box...

You may want to increase the 85% quality value, as sometimes the reduction in quality it noticeable, and at this point, it should not make that much difference in file size anyway.

So there we have it. Hope it helps :-)