SGlider12's Blog: Web 2.0 in GIMP

Alright here's a tutorial I found at TechnoMono for making Web 2.0 style text in GIMP.

Open the gimp and create a new image (CTRL+N), mine is 525x100. Change the foreground color in the toolbox to the color you want your text, press T for text tool and click on the canvas to enter your text. Choose a suitable font and size (I chose 70px "Sans Bold") and add your text (if you need to move the text use the move tool M).

Right click on the text layer in the layers stack and select "Alpa to Selection". Create a new layer named "dark-border" with a fill type of transparency. Then go Select > Grow set to 1px, then fill the selection with #221C1C using the fill tool (SHIFT+B). Lower the layer in the layer stack .

Right click on the text layer in the layer stack and select "Alpa to Selection", then go Select > Grow set to 3px. Create a new layer called "light-border", apply a linear gradient of #fdfefb to #a8aba7 from top to bottom of the selection. Lower the "light-border" layer below the "dark-border" layer in the layer stack.

Right click on the text layer in the layers stack and select "Alpa to Selection", now create another layer and call it "highlight" (move this layer above all other layers in the stack). Select the rectangular select tool (R); change the mode to subtract .
Click and drag from the lower left to the upper right going about half way up the text; you should have a selection like the following:

Press D (to reset the colors) then X (to swap the colors), the foreground color should now be white. Use the gradient tool (L) and change the gradient type to "FG to Transparent".
Change gradient type.
Click and drag from top to bottom of the text while holding CTRL.

To finish off we'll add a drop-shadow. Deselect (CTRL+SHIFT+A), then select the "light-border" layer in the layer stack and go Script-Fu > Shadow > Drop-Shadow and set x and y offsets to 0, set the blur radius to 6 then click ok.
NOTE: the text related layers must be linked together if you wish to move them as one (toggle the chain icon on in the layer stack next to the little eye).

Final Result