Thanks for visiting this GIMP page. Sadly, it's massively out-of-date. It may still be interesting to you, so I haven't taken it down.

Currently my more up-to-date GIMP projects are:

Thanks for visiting!

Zach

The power of Bump Map

Bump Maps are Cool

I don't know about you, but until recently, I completely neglected the excellent Bump Map plug-in. I just didn't know how to use it, and I didn't know what sorts of things it was useful for. Well guess what? It's a great tool for producing some incredible effects. Frederico Mena Quintero's home page has some GREAT graphics that use bump map. Check them out. Here's a few tips about it from various sources.

Subtle Paper Textures

Plug-ins needed: Add Noise, Plasma, Bump Map.

Well, OK, why is this tip useful? It helps you add some depth to otherwise flat textures. It gives a very nice, subtle roughening that looks very much like a bumpy colored piece of paper or canvas. Note: it doesn't work on all types of source images.

Let's take an image and apply Plasma and Grayify to it:

1) Sort of a dull texture

Now let's create a bump map to use on the above image. Bump maps only work if the images are the same size, and it only takes one channel from the map image if it's RGB. Tip: to create a quick blank canvas that's the same size as your original, do a Duplicate and a Clear (Alt-D Ctrl-K). Then do an Add Noise at 20 with Gauss Lock and Gray set (you DO have the latest add noise plug-in, right? :). These numbers and settings are just rough guidelines; play around and who knows what you might come up with?

2) Sort of an even DULLER texture

Now, do a Bump Map on 1 using 2 as the texture. The result is a very nifty, very textured effect:

3) Instant stone texture, or something. Use your imagination!

->
2a) is 2 Enhanced at 9, then used as a bump map.

Here's the inspiration for this tip:

To: gimp-list@scam.XCF.Berkeley.EDU
Subject: cool effect
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 00:36:33 -0700
From: Spencer Kimball 
Sender: owner-gimp-list@XCF.Berkeley.EDU
Precedence: bulk

With all the cool new plug-ins, I have to confess to screwing around
with the GIMP a bit instead of studying.  I discovered a pretty cool
effect...

Start with a 512x200 RGB image.  Run a plasma with default turbulence.
Make a 512x200 grayscale image.  Using the text tool, make a large,
piece of text in the gray image.  Add noise to the image (value 80).
Gamma the image at 0.4 twice to darken things up.  Now, from the
plasma image, run "bumpmap" with the grayscale text as the mask
and a depth of 4.  It should kick ass.

This can be extended by using the original text as a mask for compositing
another texture into the final image.

I uploaded a bunch of the resulting images...

http://www.xcf.berkeley.edu/~gimp/cool_fx_1.html

Have fun.  I've got to get back to my boring class project or
my partners will have fits and threaten me.

Spencer