I feel there is no better software choice for educational use than the GIMP.
> *** preview options ***
> preview options are needed for some important and frequently used
> scripts (i.e. adding shadow) (#52374)
I am by no means a GIMP guru, but the "previews for plugins" issue seems to be
something of a double-edged sword. I certainly agree that showing the effects
of altering parameters in the main image display is, in most cases, ideal. If I
understand correctly, one of the difficulties with accomplishing this is that
plugins communicate with the main GIMP program using a message-passing system
("The Wire") and interactive plugins are somewhat limited on the amount of
information that can be exchanged in a responsive manner. This limitation
currently has to be weighed against the benefit of permitting the entire GIMP
community to safely contribute to the GIMP (using, for the most part, their
programming language of choice). I can't imagine the GIMP having reached the
advanced state it is in without the extensibility provided by the Procedural
DataBase and plugins.
> *** some other things ***
> - Please implement an easy and fast way to instantly overlay a layer
> with a specific color or gradient (+preview option).
You can drag-n-drop a color directly from the foreground, background, or a color
dialog onto a layer; you can use the "Tools->Paint Tools->Blend" to do the same
with a gradient (I consider both of these to be "easy and fast"). A "preview
option" would introduce a confirmation step that would make the process both
more difficult and slower and, from an internal standpoint, be little different
from the use of UNDO to revert an undesired change.
> - Please implement a script to add inner glow.
There is a "Layer Effects" plugin available in the Plugin Registry which
implements this; though I would question its usage in an educational setting.
If you are trying to teach a course in user interface, fine, I understand. But
if the goal is to teach image manipulation and its algorithms then would it not
be of more use to learn "how" to add an inner glow. All of the "layer effects"
are fairly simple operations that, at their core, are just nice "packaging" of
the more important concepts of color combinations, convolutions, thresholds,
and opacities; all of which can be taught at their intuitive level with GIMP
(without a "dumbed down" user interface confusing the user).
If the suggested enhancements are taken from a "productivity" standpoint, I
might better sympathize (although I *really* like the GIMP's interface); but as
they were presented from an educator who wishes to use the GIMP in the
classroom, I would submit that what is being taught be considered.
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