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Quick Gimp Tip
Quick Gimp Tip
If you're a frequent
reader of this column, you know that I use Gimp for
all my cartoon work. And sometimes, when I need to
create a cartoon that has an added visual effect, I
turn to the Gimp and its many filters. One of the most
fun filters I use is Gaussian Blur. You can find it in
Gimp's menu by going to Filters>Blur>Gaussian
Blur. Here's the way I used Gaussian Blur in the
cartoon below.
I
like to sometimes have the foreground cartoon stand
out a bit more than the background so I scan it at a
high resolution in order to keep it as crisp as
possible. Then, I create a background using Gimp. In
this case, I added a gradient sky and then used the
cloud brush to add clouds. I did this all on a
separate layer. For the last step, I merely used
Gaussian Blur to blur the entire background layer.
This softens the clouds and sky, especailly around
the edges. I'm left with a very hard foreground
image atop a nice soft blurred image. It gives a
nice 3D effect of sorts.
Mark Szorady is a
nationally syndicated cartoonist with georgetoon.com.
He blogs at georgetoon.com/blog.