design program

What kind of design program can i use besides photoshop?

Any program that can export alpha channels and tgas. PSP and GIMP should work fine.

Has anyone used all three programs? What are the differences? Can anyone tell me more about GIMP? I went to the website but am still unsure about downloading it as I am used to PSP.

GIMP is the fourth member of the holy trinity of Photoshop, PSP, and Corel Photopaint. GIMP is its own flavor. It is a flexible image editing program, with its own advantages and disads which may or may not suit your personal style. Of course it isn't as polished and able as, say, Photoshop, but it does happen to be free. If you are used to PSP and just looking for an alternative, download GIMP and give it a try -- you may find that you prefer it, you may not. Did I mention it's totally free? It's free. Free.

while i jokingly say i limp in gimp, heh, i'd be happy to teach you what i know. i have some screen shots of the menu and tool bars and am happy to take some time to show ya what i know. i can show ya how to handle transparencies and clean up your images. that makes a huge difference in game satisfaction knowing just that little. so if you'd like a lil tutoring with the bit that i know, please feel free to contact me inworld. while i may only limp in gimp, its enough to get around! together we are strong~

Ive used photoshop gimp and Psp myself, dont know anything about Corel Photopaint but here are my thoughts.

What I experienced of gimp, it is your typical freeware graphics program, it can be very powerful if you can adjust to the learning curve, the gui and tools can be cumbersome but if youre willing to take the time you can do well with it. Although it should be noted it will not ultimately be as powerful as the comercial packages, depending on what you intend to do with it that may not be of any concern.

PSP is a good program, I have heard certain artists swear by it. For a more inexperienced graphics artist PSP can be more useful for "painterly" effects. Making textures in PSP seems to be fairly easy and there are lots of special efects filters and efects that can be achieved.
You definitely get your moneys worth and it is fairly inexpensive.

Then, there's Photoshop. Photoshop really is the 800 pound gorilla. Intuitive and powerful filters and image editing capabilities, photomanipulation, brush customization the list goes on and on. Its more or less seamless integration with the rest of Adobes image manipulation software line is the final nail in the coffin, especially for web developers or video editor, Illustrator is a wonderful programs. It can and will do anything its siblings can do. I have heard this point argued by die hard PSP'ers, who say PSP has capabilities that PS doesn't. I would be more then willing to put that theory to the test though with any PSPers who think so . Photoshop however is prohibitively expensive for most useers, and thus can be a bad choice if you're not a serious graphic artist.

In summary my experience has shown me that gimp users tend to be more casual graphics people, they need certain things occasionally and gimp is capable of their more basic and essential graphics needs at a price that cant be beat. PSP users tend to be more serious graphic artists and even into the professional realm it is very capable and powerful
and has a lot of bang for the buck for artists who cant deal with the expenses of photoshop.
Photoshop users tend to live in their graphics software, they are either very serious digital fine artists, or are professional graphics illustrators who can justify the price because they need it for their profession. So, before you go out and buy or.... "acquire" your software the first thing to ask is what you itnend to do with it and just how far you need your image software to go.

I've used Photoshop for ages, professionally and otherwise, and have played with the gimp since it was first released as a beta written for Motif on the X11R6 Widnows system. I adore both.

The Gimp has a superior gradient editor, second to none I know of. It has a myriad of odd filters that have swings in their development arcs to make things surprising. The Gimp is also always growing and changing since it's openly developed.

Having said that, I don't think I'd ever willingly use the Gimp to composit an image I was going to use for a clothing texture. I'm also fairly certain I wouldn't use Photoshop to generate a base texture to be used for clothing or building in Second Life (but I would for There.com). I most certainly would use Photoshop to touch up that image, however. Massively so.

The two programs are very different from each other and have their own strengths and weaknesses. Both take a long time to learn to use well

It all depends on how serious you are and what you're doing. Tools you know well are the best.

Poor tools requrie higher skills


Lumi

The final point to note is cost.

Photoshop is very expensive (several $100).

PSP is reasonably priced (less than $100 I think).

GIMP is free (!)

my challenge to PSP and gimp users is still open... if you have something you think psp or gimp can do that PS cant... bring it on

Quartet, maybe, yes.

I thought about making a So Long, And Thanks For All The Fish joke, then decided that religion is more applicable to application loyalty and applied blur. I suppose I just don't post enough for people to realize that I have two tongues, one for each cheek. It apparently takes a crazy old hermit to recognize that authentic Snarks ride their banter single file, to hide their numbers.

EDIT: Added explanatory Amazon.com link. The rest of it, you're on your own.

bad bad snark.

*this message has been brought to you from the people for the ethical treatment of esoteric and obscure puns*