CrunchBang - Code, Design & GNU/Linux

Ubuntu Logo GIMP Brushes

I couldn't find any Ubuntu logo GIMP brushes on the Ubuntu Wiki Artwork/Official page, so I've created some. The brushes are quite large, but now that GIMP supports scalable brushes they can be easily scaled down in size.

There are 3 brushes, colour, shaded and mono, see the example image below:

Get the brushes

Download the tarball from the address below and extract to ~/.gimp-2.4/brushes.
http://crunchbang.org/misc/ubuntu-logo-gimp-brushes.tar.gz

Alternatively, if you're an Ubuntu user you may find it quicker to use the command line, follow these instructions:

1. Open a new terminal window and move into your GIMP brushes directory:

cd ~/.gimp-2.4/brushes

2. Download the tarball with the following command:

wget http://crunchbang.org/misc/ubuntu-logo-gimp-brushes.tar.gz

3. Extract the tarball:

tar xvf ubuntu-logo-gimp-brushes.tar.gz

4. Clean up, delete the tarball:

rm ubuntu-logo-gimp-brushes.tar.gz

Enjoy :)

Note*
The Ubuntu logo is protected by copyright and/or trademark. Please refer to the Ubuntu Trademark Policy for details.

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]

Butterfly [photo by Kevin Saff]

I can haz Lomoz filter [photo by Adelle Roux]

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...".

150 Extra GIMP Brushes for Ubuntu

I love playing around with GIMP, it's a fantastic piece of software. I use it to design websites and web graphics. I have to admit that it took me a while to really get used to using it. I was used to using Adobe Photoshop and Macromedia Fireworks. GIMP in comparison to these seemed archaic and not too user friendly. I can see now that this is not the case and I'm glad that I persevered and continued to use GIMP. GIMP is now my friend.

Anyhow, by default GIMP comes with a rather limited set of brushes. There's a package available from the Ubuntu repositories to install some extra brushes, however this is also a little limited. To this end, I've created a new package containing over 150 additional brushes for GIMP.

Example GIMP brushes included in the package

Solid square brushes, ideal for leaders, dotted leaders and headers [best used with Pen tool]:

Various pixel shape brushes, again ideal for decorative leaders etc [best used with Pen tool]:

Miscellaneous shaped brushes for decorative use [best used with Brush tool]:

Barcode brushes, not overly useful but a personal favourite :)

Star and snowflake brushes, ideal for creating those Christmas greeting cards [best used with Brush tool]:

Get the Brushes

I've made the brushes available through a number of sources. Firstly you can get the .deb package directly from my PPA on Launchpad: http://launchpadlibrarian.net/10450525/gimp-brushes_0.0.1~ppa1_all.deb

The .tar.gz archive file is also available here: http://launchpadlibrarian.net/10450317/gimp-brushes_0.0.1~ppa1.tar.gz

Or to install via apt simply follow the instructions below [only tested with Gutsy]:

1. Open your apt sources.list file for editing with the following terminal command:

gksudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

2. Add the following two lines to the bottom of the file:

deb     http://ppa.launchpad.net/corenominal/ubuntu gutsy main
deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/corenominal/ubuntu gutsy main

3. Close gedit and issue the following terminal command to update apt:

sudo apt-get update

4. Still in the terminal, enter the following command to install the package:

sudo apt-get install gimp-brushes

5. Enjoy your new GIMP brushes!

License

The brushes are licensed under GPL. Please feel free to modify, repackage and redistribute — it would be good if people created packages native to their Linux distros.

IAB Templates for Gimp 2.4

One of my first commercial web design jobs involved producing sets of banners and buttons for a marketing agency. It wasn't the most glamorous work, but it paid well and provided good work experience.

At the time I was a Windows user and I remember having to create the images from scratch. I had to reference the IAB Ad Unit Guidelines for each new image so as to get the correct dimensions.

Anyhow, I've recently started creating some banners and buttons for Ubuntu. I've been using Gimp to create the images and I wanted a quick-and-easy way to create a new file with the correct dimensions. To accomplish this I edited Gimp's templaterc file and created a new template entry for each of the IAB Ad Units. Those being:

Rectangles and Pop-Ups:

300 x 250 px - Medium Rectangle
250 x 250 px - Square Pop-Up
240 x 400 px - Vertical Rectangle
336 x 280 px - Large Rectangle
180 x 150 px - Rectangle
300 x 100 px - 3:1 Rectangle
720 x 300 px - Pop-Under

Banners and Buttons:

468 x 60 px - Full Banner
234 x 60 px - Half Banner
88 x 31 px - Micro Bar
120 x 90 px - Button 1
120 x 60 px - Button 2
120 x 240 px - Vertical Banner
125 x 125 px - Square Button
728 x 90 px - Leaderboard

Skyscrapers:

160 x 600 px - Wide Skyscraper
120 x 600 px - Skyscraper
300 x 600 px - Half Page Ad

Install the template file

You can get the file here: http://crunchbang.org/misc/templaterc.txt

Or, if you're an Ubuntu Gutsy user you can follow these instructions:

1. Close Gimp if it's running

2. Open a terminal and backup your 'templaterc' file with the following command:

cp ~/.gimp-2.4/templaterc ~/.gimp-2.4/templaterc-bak

3. Still in the terminal, enter the following command to download my 'templaterc` file:

wget http://crunchbang.org/misc/templaterc.txt

4. Move the file to your Gimp directory with the following terminal command:

mv templaterc.txt ~/.gimp-2.4/templaterc

5. Start Gimp, select "File -> New" from the menu and select the template you want.

6. Create a beautiful web banner or button to promote your favourite free OSS!