Re: [Gimp-user] Q's & Help from you all for me (Pat Hammons)

[Steve Kinney <admin pilobilus net>]

On 02/21/2017 07:03 PM, Patricia Hammons wrote:

[...]

> What I do have that may be similar to this is for my camera using EasyShare
> Software when I download my pictures that I can resize, crop, red-eye out,
> etc. **But I do have to advise you of a medical condition I have that may
> help you to understand why I need some extra help. As I said, I am 61,
> senior grad student - but I also have MD-D which is Macular
> Degeneration-Dry, which is an inherited eye disease I got diagnosed with
> 2.5-3 years ago. My mother had it for the last 15 years of her life & she
> died in 2012 at age 95. They thought I had beaten the odds on not getting it
> & it was misdiagnosed as being part of my migraines I have had since my
> early 20's. Come to find out it was not & that is why I was having trouble
> reading my textbooks or taking tests, I could & cannot see stuff clearly
> anymore. My mother had the "wet" version & never "dry" and she went Legally
> Blind, which what I have is 1 step below going Legally Blind. So I am taking
> (4) horse pills a day & (2) Fish Oil pills trying to save my sight & going
> to the eye doctor every 6 months. I have to read my textbooks now as a PDF.
> So everything in my life has changed & I need to see if your program would
> be worth download & will I be able to learn it & see if big enough? 

[...]

Hi Particia,

The first thing I would suggest is, get a larger monitor.  The biggest
one you can afford - and if price is a problem, scout around for used
ones.  You can plug a monitor right into your laptop, tweak the
resolution and viola:  World of problems solved, across /all/ the things
you use a computer for.  This is especially important for photo editing,
since you need to be able to see the "big picture" as well as details as
clearly as possible.  You will also want both your image /and/ the
GIMP's toolbox on the screen at the same time.

The GIMP itself is here:  https://www.gimp.org/downloads/

It's Free Software, no fees, no ads, no BS.

You can also install a GIMP theme with larger than normal icons; giving
up a little screen space for easier to find buttons sounds like a good
trade off in your situation:

http://www.gimp-forum.net/Thread-GIMP-2-8-Large-size-Icons-Themes

Other than that, I suggest the "usual stuff" for beginners:

* There are a LOT of good tutorials on the Interent for doing specific
tasks in the GIMP - seek and ye shall find.

* Don't neglect to search YouTube for tutorials on how to do things in
the GIMP - there are a LOT of them, they vary in quality but the better
ones are excellent.

* When you get stuck, ask here.  The Gimp-user list is the closest thing
to a help desk we have.

I have a tutorial up that you might find useful now /and/ later, as it
briefly covers a lot of concepts about setting up the GIMP, "tricky new
ideas" like the difference between "saving" and "exporting" a file, what
layers and masks are, some custom setup ideas that you might find useful
/after/ you have the very very basics under control, and links to other
resources.

http://pilobilus.net/gimp_tutorial.html

The GIMP is a /huge/ tool that does /tons/ of things.  The good news is,
you don't need to understand more than maybe 5% of those things to get
it to do everything you need for your project.  Don't let it overwhelm
you; DO play with it just to see what this or that thingy is/does/means etc.

:o)

Steve