Thursday, November 29th, 2007

GIMP Lomo Filter

I really like the Lomo photo effect and I'd love to own a real Lomo camera — I just don't take enough pictures to warrant the purchase. Luckily the Lomo effect can be digitally emulated using a GIMP filter, and the results aren't too bad. See the before and after examples below:

Dragonfly [photo by peeper]

Dragonfly photo before GIMP Lomo filter. Dragonfly photo after GIMP Lomo filter.

Butterfly [photo by Kevin Saff]

Butterfly photo before GIMP Lomo filter. Butterfly photo after GIMP Lomo filter.

I can haz Lomoz filter [photo by Adelle Roux]

Cat photo before GIMP Lomo filter. Cat photo after GIMP Lomo filter.

Get the filter

The GIMP filter that I used on the above images was originally written by Francois Le Lay. It has since been updated by Donncha O Caoimh to work with GIMP 2.4 [installed by default on Ubuntu 7.10.] The script is released under GPL.

You can download the script from directly from: http://crunchbang.org/misc/gimplomo.scm

Place the script in your "~/.gimp-2.4/scripts/" directory.

Alternatively, if you're an Ubuntu user you'll probably find it quicker to use the terminal:

1. Open a terminal and enter the following command to download the filter:

wget http://crunchbang.org/misc/gimplomo.scm

2. Move the filter to the correct directory with this command:

mv gimplomo.scm ~/.gimp-2.4/scripts/gimplomo.scm

Usage

Run or restart GIMP, open an image file to work on and select: "Filters -> Light and Shadow -> Lomo...".

Tagged with: artwork, gimp, images, ubuntu


10 Responses to “GIMP Lomo Filter”

  1. Donncha O Caoimh wrote,

    Nice example images! It really is a nice effect isn't it?

  2. Philip wrote,

    @Donncha: It is, thanks for doing the work and updating the script :)

  3. Vincent wrote,

    Wow, that really is an awesome plugin! I applied it to a few pictures of mine, unfortunately my 23hq.com quote for this month is full (that's why I don't have another blog post yet ;-)) otherwise I'd show them :)

  4. ArtInvent wrote,

    The photos on the left suffer from low contrast and muted colors. On the right this has been improved. This can (and should) be easily achieved with any number of standard tools like contrast, levels slider, saturation, etc. 'Lomo' seems to be a marketing ploy and maybe a shooting philosophy more than an actual specific photographic effect. "Shoot,don't think," casual everyday shots using cheap cameras with plastic lenses, haphazard focus, etc. While I'm sure this philosophy plus camera can result in interesting shots, not really sure how any such 'filter' fits into this scenario.

  5. Philip wrote,

    @ArtInvent: You state:

    This can (and should) be easily achieved with any number of standard tools like contrast, levels slider, saturation, etc.

    You're quite correct and this is exactly what the filter/plugin does.

    You also state:

    'Lomo' seems to be a marketing ploy and maybe a shooting philosophy more than an actual specific photographic effect. "Shoot,don't think," casual everyday shots using cheap cameras with plastic lenses, haphazard focus, etc.

    True, however there is a distinctive look to many Lomo images and this is what the author of the filter has attempted to emulate. Personally, I think he's done a good job.

    And Finally:

    While I'm sure this philosophy plus camera can result in interesting shots, not really sure how any such 'filter' fits into this scenario.

    I guess a little imagination goes a long way :) Seriously though, the filter is supposed to be fun, the same fun as the Lomo philosophy promotes. Fits perfectly for me.

  6. Vincent wrote,

    OK, new month, my 23hq quota has been reset again.

    For some photo's it looked quite good; compare this to this and this to this.

    However, in some cases I wouldn't say it was looking that good, though perhaps it could've been had I played with the parameters a bit.

    Compare this to this and this to this.

    I guess it works better when there isn't one dominant colour.

    (All pics are CC-BY-SA of course)

  7. Philip wrote,

    @Vincent: Nice pictures! They're BIG aren't they, no wonder you exceed your 23hq limit :D

    Regarding the filter, I've found that it can be a hit 'n' miss affair. Like you say, it depends on the colour content of the original image. Having said that, I still prefer your "after" images, even in the last two examples. I guess it's all subjective!? Good work :)

  8. Vincent wrote,

    Philip, 23 has a limit of 30 pictures per month, no size restrictions ;-)

  9. northern california drug rehab wrote,

    I tried this script, and it's previous avatar on a b&W (originally a RGB) image, but kept getting the following error: Error while executing script-fu-lomo: Error: set!: unbound variable: endingx. Can it be fixed?

  10. Philip wrote,

    @northern california drug rehab: I am not too sure, I have not used this for a while. I will take a look as soon as I get some spare time.

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