Playing

Recently, I told Jeff I wanted Photoshop. I don't have just a fantastic camera, and it is several years old. I feel like the photos I take aren't all that great, and part of the problem is the camera (part of it is me), but I think I could pretty them up a little in Photoshop.

Turns out, Photoshop is kinda pricey. As in $800 pricey. So Jeff suggested that I look at GIMP, which is a free photo-editing software. (And we all know, "free" is his favorite price.)

So I downloaded GIMP tonight.

First of all, I have no idea what I am doing. I don't know what all the options mean, or even what all the words mean. It keeps talking about layers and I don't understand how to make different layers. Also, I have basically zero design sense, so I have a hard time figuring out if something looks good or not. I know how to make a photo look different. But does it look better?

Anyway I did some very basic playing around tonight. First, the original. You remember this photo, right?


Then I did this to it. I just edited the brightness and the contrast. (Yes, I know it was too much. My forehead has become its own light source.)


Then I colorized it. I don't really know what that means, so I can't explain it. I clicked "colorize" and this is what happened.

I actually think it looks kinda cool.

Finally, I oilified it. That's right, I said I "oilified" it. Apparently, this is supposed to make it look like an oil painting. There isn't that much difference between this photo and the second one, but there are a few distinctions.

Changing the contrast seemed to accentuate my moles (omg, did I just type that?) but the oilified image smooths them back out again. That's better in my book.