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Patreon Exclusive: The Story of JankGIMP (Patreon)

Published:
2023-12-29 19:34:45
Imported:
2024-02

Content

Please enjoy this 7 minute Tantacrul video, where I bring out the GIMP. For your eyes only.

Hope you enjoy!

Files

The Story of JankGIMP (Patreon Exclusive)

Bring out your Jank!

Comments

P4rp

Any thoughts on FreeCAD?

Guineafowl

Oh man, I was very excited about the video, because I feel like I know most of GIMP's not-completely-obscure functionality pretty well, and actually none of it drives me insane, despite its reputation and the fact that I've explored most of it on my own, so I was really curious to see how I'd managed to solve/circumvent the problems you were gonna criticize. Problem is, you managed to zoom in on the one non-obscure thing that I never would've found in a million years, because I just never change defaults. I don't like to alter this sorta stuff, like presets for a virtual instrument, or themes for a code editor, I always fork off of them and create my own, keeping the default intact, because of a combination of an irrational anxiety and the desire to keep my shit separate from the built-in stuff. But yeah, I agree, the way GIMP handles this is maddening, no question about it, I was just lucky to have avoided it completely, because of the way I am, hahaha. Two remarks: - The fact that the textbox containing the selected dynamic's name and the icon next to it function as search utility never really tripped me over, because they look and behave the same way the font selector does in the text tool, which I had explored prior to messing with dynamics, and where I guess the same thing feels more intuitive. Still, it would be better if the textbox was as a combobox, and if the edit-looking button did actually let you edit. - The panel on the right side is prolly my least favorite part about GIMP. I feel like it kinda wants to function like, for example, MuseScore's right panel, but it fails at it. Having the Layers and Channels there is good, that's what I use it for 90% of the time; everything else feels like an arbitrary set of subtools that are way too numerous and specific, while they could actually help mitigate the complexity of the left panel if they were properly taken advantage of, but they aren't. And here comes the passionate defense nobody asked for: I guess the overabundance of shit you see on the screen at all times you mentioned is prolly the main reason people frown upon GIMP. While it's a fair critique, I feel like it's worth mentioning that, firstly, I think it's not that bad, especially by FOSS standards; secondly, the degree to which GIMP handles complexity poorly is not especially bad compared to other widely used, similarly complex apps. The way the MS Office suite uses that tiny corner button everywhere to open huge windows with a gazillion options is only one level of abstraction away from this, and is about as daunting. I get that having a small, immediately clear set of tools put in the forefront saves the new user from the initial shock, but having core functionality hidden behind those buttons that immediately pile endless complexity on their head is similarly shocking, and it can yield small doses of the "oh no, what I'm looking for is probably _there_, and I have to dig for it again" effect over a prolonged time period. And thirdly, the complexity that is there, is at least logical imo. I love GIMP's menu system, I think it's much better than that of most creative/office apps I've used, and it is pretty much the sole reason I was able to learn most of what I know about this app on my own. There are no synonymous or arbitrarily intersected menus (a lá Sibelius), its structure is consistent without sacrificing common sense (i.e.: hiding core functions behind way too many clicks, in the name of sound architecture, a lá Dorico), and 99% of what I wanted to find during the learning process was where I was looking for it by just reading text. I find this extremely neat and helpful, and it also helps GIMP avoid what I view as a common problem among creative apps, which is what I call hotkey-dependency. The big one would obviously be Blender, but less batshit apps are also guilty of burying functionality so deep in the menus, that everyone is essentially forced to start off by learning a set of key combinations, which is something that's personally one of the most daunting things in an app for me.