Posted December 4th, 2009
The History Of GIMP – Part 1
The History Of GIMP
Since my last little Gimp article I have had a few people contact me asking me to write some more information about GIMP and if I know where to get some add-ons, brushes and last but not least some good tutorials for Gimp.
Before becoming an avid Photoshop user, I started my graphic design career using
GIMP. I do still use GIMP a little. In this post I think I will dedicate it to the actual history of
GIMP and highlight some of it’s features.
If you don’t know yet, Gimp is a free photo/graphics editor which does pretty
much the same as Photoshop does but on a smaller scale. Having said that, don’t
get me wrong even though Gimp isn’t as powerful as Photoshop, it is still powerful
enough as far as graphic design and photo manipulators software goes.
As of writing this post, Gimp 2.6 is the current version, so any features mentioned
in this article will relate to GIMP version 2.6. The thing with Gimp
and I suppose with most other software, the developers of Gimp are always updating
current versions of Gimp. This is a good thing for Gimp users as it shows that the
developers are serious of making Gimp one of the best free graphics editor.
Did you know that when development of Gimp started in 1995, it was going to just be an
image retouching and editing tool? Now with Gimp you can design just about any
graphic, and besides being an image retouching and editing tool you can use Gimp for
the following tasks:
So how cool are some of those features? I think they are mighty cool!!
For those who are unable to afford expensive applications like Photoshop for use on
graphics designs, GIMP is an ideal alternative for both amateur and professional
graphic designer.
In 1995 the development of GIMP began by the original creators, Peter Mattis and
Spencer Kimball and it all started as a semester project in Berkeley at the
University of California. When work first started, GIMP originally stood for
General Image Manipulation Program.
GIMP version 0.54 was first released to the public in January 1996 and in 1997
GIMP became part of the GNU Project and the acronym of GIMP was then changed to
GNU Image Manipulation Program.
Today the enhancement and maintenance of GIMP are carried out purely by a group
of volunteers under the GNOME Project auspice. Good on you guys and a huge thank
you!!
In my next post about GIMP I will continue a little more on the history of GIMP
and mention some new features in the current version which is 2.6.
In the meantime you can download GIMP for free here, http://www.gimp.org/downloads/
give it a whirl and familiarize
yourself with it’s work space as soon I shall be pointing you to some websites where
you can get some great tutorials on ways to do certain designs with some great effects.
Until then enjoy one of the best free image editing and graphic design programs on the internet today!
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