Smiley Tutorial

Ooh, two tutorials in two days. I'm on a role...hehe...

Anyway, today I'm going to teach you how to make smilies in Gimp. This is a very easy tutorial.

1) Create a new 19x19 transparent image.
2) Zoom in to about 800%. Click the ellipse select tool. Create a circle that fills up the entire space. Fill it with a dark yellow.

3) Now select the gradient tool with the selection still activated. Select a lighter yellow as your foreground color. Now, in the gradients dialog, select FG to Transparent. Drag the gradient from the top to the bottom. You should have something like this (note I am zoomed to 800%):


4) Create a new layer. Select the ellipse tool again. Select an area about the size of an eye. Fill it with a semi-dark shade of gray. Again with the gradient tool, and white as your foreground color, drag the gradient tool from top to bottom. Shrink the selection by one pixel and fill it with black for the pupil. Do this again for the second eye. You should have something like this:


5) Now for the mouth. Create a new layer. Select the paths tool. Create an area about the shape of an open, smiling mouth. Move the points and the lines to get the shape you want. Once you have it, click the "Path to Selection" button. Your path should have changed to a selection. Fill it with a dark red. Then shrink the selection one pixel. Fill it with a darker red or black. Deselect. Zoom out to 100%. You should have something like this:


There you go! A smiling smiley!

Web 2.0 Badges

Today I will be teaching you how to make Web 2.0 badges in Gimp. Pretty simple to catch on I must say.

1) Create a new image that is 300x300, white background.
2) Add a new layer. Select the ellipse select tool. Select an area that nearly fills up the canvas.
3) Now we want our border color. Select color 0159d2 and fill the circle with it using the paint bucket tool. Do not deselect yet. You should have something like this:



4) With the circle still selected, create a new layer. Go to Select -> Shrink. Shrink the selection by two pixels. Press D to reset your foreground and background colors. Press X to switch them. White should be in front.

5) Click the gradient tool. In the gradients menu, select FG to Transparent. Fill the selection with the gradient by dragging it from top to bottom. Hold the CTRL button while you do it to keep the line straight. You should have something like this:


6) Now we will add some text. Add the text toward the center with white font. Position it somewhere in the center. Merge the text layer down with the rest of the badge.

7) Now we will create a reflection on the badge. Click the ellipse select tool. Select somewhere toward the top left corner of the badge. Then, click the magic wand tool. Put it in subtract mode, and, with the badges layer selected, select the empty space. This should leave just part of the badge selected:


8) Now, create a new layer. Fill the selection with white. Lower the opacity to about 33. Merge the layers.

9) Select the layer the badge is on. Go to Filters -> Light and Shadow -> Drop Shadow. Set the offsets to zero, the blur radius to 10. Uncheck allow resizing. Raise opacity to about 85.

10) Select the layer that the badge is on. In the layers dialog, click the duplicate layers button. You should now have two badges. Select the duplicated layer. Go to Layer -> Transform -> Flip Vertically. Move the flipped layer under the original layer. Now you can merge the original badge layer with the drop shadow layer.

11) Right click on the flipped badge's layer in the layers dialog and select Alpha to Selection. Select the gradient tool. Choose FG to Transparent. Make sure white is in the foreground. Drag the gradient tool from bottom to top. There you have it! A basic web 2.0 badge.

Sigs in Gimp

I've seen a lot of tutorials like this on how to make sigs in Gimp. I thought I would make my own, too.

1) First, we need to make a background. I am going to make a grunge style background based on the tutorial from GimpTalk. First, you need to get some grunge brushes in order to do this. Go to DeviantArt.com and search for grunge gimp brushes or just Google some. Now, create a new image, 400x150, with a white background. Create a new layer, name it grunge. Brush your grunge brushes on it with a black color. Completely cover the layer.


2) Now, go to Colors -> Color Balance. Change the color balance of the grunge layer to something that suits your needs. You can also go to Colors -> Colorize and change the colors from there.

3) Do a motion blur. Go to Filters -> Blur -> Motion Blur. Blur Type: Linear, Length:121, Angle:115.


4) Create a new layer. Now use your grunge brushes in white on the layer. Do a motion blur on the layer again. Linear, 160, 0. Lower the opacity to about 60.


5) Create a new layer, name it clouds. Go to Filter -> Render -> Clouds -> Solid Noise. Leave the settings as they are. Now go to Colors -> Color Balance. Play around with the settings until you come up with something you like.


6) Create a new layer. Paint your grunge brushes on this layer in black. Fill up the layer but don't get too dark. When you're done, change the layer mode to Overlay. Create another layer and paint your grunge brushes in white. Set the mode to Overlay. Repeat steps one and two as many times as you want but don't use too dark of colors. Then, use the color balance again.


7) Alright, now that you have a background, you need a render. Go to PlanetRenders.net or Google one. Add your new render to your sig. Position it toward the left or somewhere you like it. What I did with mine was after I positioned it, I made it about 80% opaque, duplicated the layer, then set that layer to overlay.


8) Now, we need to add some text. Position it towards the right. I lowered the opacity on the text, then duplicated the layer, setting the second layer to overlay. There you go. A simple way to make sigs.

Software Boxes

Here's that tutorial I promised on how to make a software box. (You can click on the images to enlarge them.)

1) Open Gimp. Create a new image with a white background, that is 400px by 550px.
2) First, we need to make the boxes face that will be in the front for all to see. Create a new transparent layer. Name it front base. Select the Rectangle Selection tool and create a box that is about 260 by 340 pixels. Using the Paintbucket tool, fill your selection with whatever the base color of your box will be. I am making a Firefox software box so my base color will be blue. You should have something like this:


3) Now, using the perspective tool, we will change the perspective of the front of the box so it appears as if we are viewing it from an angle. Just mess around with the box until you find something similar to mine:


4) Now we need to make the side of the box. Create a new layer, name it side base. Pick the Rectangle Selection tool again. Make another rectangle whose length is equal the side of the box we have already made. Fill it with your base color, then get your perspective tool again, and shape it to where it looks like the two pieces form a box. It will take a bit of work to get it just right. Leave a tiny bit of white space between the two pieces to make it look more like a box. It should look somewhat like mine:

5) Now we will add the graphics that you see on boxes. Graphics differ from box to box so yours may not turn out like mine. For the Gimp one I made, I simply took a screenshot of Gimp, put that on the front, and took the Gimp logo and the splattered Wilber images from the Gimp website. Theres no limit to what your box can look like. Use your imagination. But here's the catch: everything you put on your box has to be in perspective. So, when you add your logo or screenshot or whatever, make it in perspective using the perspective tool. Here's what mine looks like:

6) Merge all the layers together except for the background layer. We will now add a drop shadow. Go to Filters -> Light and Shadow -> Drop Shadow. Set the X offset to -5, the Y offset to 5, the blur radius to 15, opacity to 80, and do not allow resizing. You should have something like this:

There you go. Now what I gave you are extremely basic instructions on how to make a software box. Play around with it and figure out what you like best. You can add neat little designs to it such as stripes and curvatures and such like the orange bars on my Gimp box, which you can see in my last post.

Well, there you go.