GIMP help please

Hello all,

first, i gotta tell you this whole forum on design has been incredibly helpful. i'm learning to make skins and was entirely hopeless before i found this. now i'm merely pathetic, which really does beat hopeless...

so this is my absolutely ridiculous question. i cannot figure this out in GIMP... i know how to scale and work layers and all that stuff, the one thing i can NOT find is how to resize things by grabbing a handle and stretching them, from the sides, top and bottom or diagonally(like prims, except 2d). i know the functionality is in the program because i ACCIDENTALLY turned it on last night and was deliriously happy and now i have no clue how i did it.

so. it's embarrassing to ask, but i'm really wiped out and would be very greatful for the answer since i'm trying to trace an eyebrow and right now it's obliterating my template's entire head.

thanks very much.
anik

Make sure the working layer is selected.
On the gimp toolbar panel, the 5 buttons before the Text button and after the crop button will be for transformations. Click the one you need the click on the image or part you wish to change, it "should" show the grab handles.

ok. i got that to work and thank you very much.

now one more. is there a way to maintain transparency while resizing the photo or is there a way to make the grid show up while resizing - everytime i pull the handle, the photo obliterates anything i've set on top of it that is usually visible, in particular, the grid.

Thanks again very much.
Anik

Am there, doing that...in other words, me, too.

Personally i use a combo of photoshop,corel painter and paintshop pro for my work in game however these can be expensive,the gimp is free but can be a lot of hard work so you might want to try www.artweaver.de this is still in beta testing and free at the moment its a much more powerful tool and closer to corel painter and photoshop than the gimp,it saves targa with alpha layers.ive only had quick tests on it but seems very stable but because beta id advise saving your work every 10 minutes or so,its a clean program no spyware etc no registry involved either.

I will stick with the gimp. It has quirks but is reletivly full featured now. Besides, I use Linux.

When resizing, and I know what you're talking about, try sliding the transparency down on that layer while you resize.