Posted under General
Both GIMP and Krita are free, open-source alternatives to Photoshop in terms of painting and photomanipulation.
I mostly use Krita nowadays, but a decade before, I had dabbled on GIMP.
Around that time there was drama around GIMP's host, Sourceforge,
and I had trouble finding other free programs on PC until I found (Autodesk) Sketchbook and Krita.
I'm just wonder on how GIMP is doing now, so that I might dabble on it again?
And how does GIMP compare to Krita, and the other way around?
Don't GIMP and Krita have different purposes?
alexyorim said:
I'm just wonder on how GIMP is doing now, so that I might dabble on it again?
As I recall, the big issue with SourceForge was that they loved to add in semi-functional (at best) bloatware and adware to many of the programs they hosted (like unnecessary user bars), typically added to installers in such a way that someone could easily install them by accident if they just rapidly clicked through the install screens, blindly trusting that only the desired program would be installed as one would expect.
These are my programs of choice. #too poor for photoshop.
In the end two are better than one and it does feel like they do have different purposes.
Krita has a great brush so it works well for drawing. Gimp's brush is quite awful and drawing with it is pain.
Gimp has a great selection of filters and overall photo manipulation feels easier to use, Krita's default filters are heavily lacking. (Addons can help though)
Gimp file support seems better, at least for EXR which i need for 3d arts. Kritas EXR loader and exporter is bit weak. Krita does better loading the PSD (probably because it has better layer structure).
Krita has a modern-looking setup for exporting animations, while gimps animation export is awkward to use (it uses layers instead of keyframes). Though gimp does better at squishing GIFs into desired sizes.
So for me it is
Do you want to draw new content? -> krita
Do you want to edit something existing -> gimp
If I draw something it is likely done in krita, and then passed onto gimp to edit it more, experiment with adjusting colors and such.
Another krita user, love all the functionalities of this free software 'w'
The only thing that annoys me about krita is the text tool, it feels awful and clunky to use for some reason, so still gotta use other softwares like GIMP for such stuff.
The "timelapse" and "animating" tools are awesome tho
I should tryout krita someday...
m3g4p0n1 said:
Another krita user, love all the functionalities of this free software 'w'The only thing that annoys me about krita is the text tool, it feels awful and clunky to use for some reason, so still gotta use other softwares like GIMP for such stuff.
The "timelapse" and "animating" tools are awesome tho
Its annoying on gimp, each tine I want to change the font I have to control a my text
I dont know how much worse it is on krita, but Id like to know an alternative where adding and editing text is simple.
wolfmanfur said:
I should tryout krita someday...Its annoying on gimp, each tine I want to change the font I have to control a my text
I dont know how much worse it is on krita, but Id like to know an alternative where adding and editing text is simple.
On krita, you type your text on a popup window, and save it every time you wanna change something.
"Control a on the text" is regular behavior on any text editing thing afaik, but krita's way is just... awkward.
Last I checked Krita was more streamlined than GIMP for drawing, some better tools, but visually janky on occasion. It also violates some of my expectations for how the UI should behave. But it, like GIMP, is probably also a bit different in UI behaviour on Windows. For example the 'I have to control+A my text to change font' behaviour of GIMP mentioned by wolfmanfur isn't a thing on Linux AFAICS.
I prefer drawing in GIMP 2.10 (after paper, that is). But I acknowledge the number of options to deal with are a bit excessive, and if you want to construct with ellipses, it's a little obtuse (convert an ellipse to path, then use transform tool on that path / dupes of that path, rather than trying to literally draw ellipses).
In either case I'd recommend fullscreening / toggling off docks, to work undistracted, and also taking the time to work out a somewhat optimized set of keyboard shortcuts.
If you do install GIMP particularly for filtering purposes, I would recommend also installing the GMIC plugin for gimp (see https://gmic.eu ). Don't get distracted by the huge array of filters, but there are some very useful ones. It's also a bit easier to control than GIMP's builtin filters -- for example, applying 'Smooth [bilateral]' to alpha channel to 'solidify' it, or to smooth just the red or green channels to give a chromatic aberration feeling.. you just select the filter and then change the 'Channel(s)' setting to what you want before applying.
Also in that case be aware of the command search in GIMP [2], it can save a lot of menuing.
[2] May be triggered by /, I don't remember if that's my customized binding. If that doesn't work then it's whatever is listed for 'search and run a command' in the Keyboard Shortcuts dialog (which is accessed quickly via Edit->Keyboard Shortcuts. I think this menu entry is probably new from your POV given that you are even mentioning Sourceforge :)
GIMP is a general purpose image editor (like Photoshop) and Krita is a purpose-built drawing program (like CSP). I use both for different purposes.
chesapeake said:
GIMP is a general purpose image editor (like Photoshop) and Krita is a purpose-built drawing program (like CSP). I use both for different purposes.
Oddly enough I find krita quite good at editting images as well.
Mostly in regards to polishing 3d renders.
The fact that Krita has full non-destructive editing and adjustment layers means it beats anything that isn't Photoshop for me, whether that's for photo manipulation, drawing, or creating bitmap graphical/UI elements.
