Free Image Manipulation Software: Why Use Photoshop When There's The GIMP?

As a college student who majored in Web Design and Development, I was trained to work with Adobe's Photoshop not only to manipulate images but also to generate electronic copies of wire frames for web sites. The ability of Photoshop to slice a fully designed template into a functional web site is probably one of it's most impressive features. However, there are some drawbacks to this "advantage" of Photoshop which is why my professor didn't dwell too long on such a topic. The days of table based layouts are over. Of course such sites still exist on the web, but many of them are old and not frequently updated.

Although Photoshop is able to make a web template functional using CSS, I find that, unless they've improved the program since I used it, the code generated is messy. This won't affect the visual results, but it can create headaches when the time comes to alter that jumbled code. Understandably, my professor emphasized external CSS files to control and keep separate the style from the content. Nevertheless, we continued to work heavily with Photoshop to do wire frames, visual layouts, and edit images and photos.

The disadvantage to this reliance on Photoshop was that the software was installed in only one classroom making it very inconvenient for students. Using a trial version of the program is insufficient to survive until graduation. Although the software can be purchased at the discounted student price, why should that money be spent when the GIMP can be used instead and is free? The GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program) has been descried as being a clone of Photoshop. While that statement isn't necessarily accurate, it does convey the truth that the GIMP can do practically anything that Photoshop can and in a similar way.

GIMP, the free image editing software is available by download from Gimp.org. The program comes in three versions, one for MS Windows, one for Linux and now there's the GIMP for Mac OS 10. Also, most popular distributions of Linux such as Fedora come "bundled" with the GIMP for the user's convenience. Users of Linux flavors that don't include the GIMP may usually obtain it through their distribution's repository. A repository is best described as a store house of additional software available for a specific flavor (distro) of Linux. I run both Fedora and Puppy Linux and I like both. I had to download the GIMP for Puppy; it works great!

The GIMP will not only save students money, but also give them the convenience of using this powerful image editing software in their home. The GIMP saves .psd files with no trouble. Once they've downloaded it, they can legally install it on as many PC's as they'd like and copy and share it with their friends.