Basic Siggy Techniques (GIMP)

 Basic Siggy Techniques (GIMP)

Video Tutorial:



**This is made to go along with the step-by-step, not as a stand alone tutorial. Enjoy!**

Step-By-Step Tutorial:

Just letting you know, I'm not very experienced with GIMP so I tried my best with this tutorial. 

First, open GIMP

Once it is open, go to File/ New... A window will pop up. The size I usually use for siggys is 600 pixels (width) x 100 pixels (height). For the resolution I usually keep it at 72 pixels. If it is a bigger document I will change it to around 300 pixels. You can leave everything else on the default settings. After changing the size and resolution, click "OK". 

 

 You now have a blank document and you are ready to start making your siggy! 

Let's start out with the "Text" tool. It looks like a capital A and is located above the pink eraser icon in the toolbar on the left-hand side of the page.  

Choose a font from the drop down box at the bottom right of the page and the size. Click somewhere on the document and a text box will pop up. Type whatever you would like to appear on your siggy. Click "Close" to close the box. To make the box that the text is in larger, click and drag one of the corners. To increase/decrease the size of the text click the arrows under the font options to adjust size.  

 Before I go on, I want to explain about the layers panel. This panel is by default at the top right hand side of the page. You can move it wherever you would like. If you cannot see it, go to the "Windows" menu in the top bar and choose "Dockable Dialogs" and then "Layers" and it should show up. As you can see, at this point you have two layers, the background (bottom) is the first layer that comes with the new document. The layer on top is your text layer which is automatically created when you add text with the text tool. Layers listed towards the top of the layer will be on top (or in front) of the layers underneath it in the list. Keep in mind that when you add text (or any images) it will automatically be added above the layer you have currently selected. To move a layer, have it selected and click the icon that looks like a four way arrow. 

 

Now let's add a plain background. First choose a color from the color panel. It looks like two boxes overlapping each other. The box in the front is the foreground color and the box behind is the background color. Double click on the front (foreground) box and choose whichever color you like. For this tutorial, I chose red. Now make sure your background layer is selected and click on the document. Your plain color should be behind the text. If it is not then drag the colored layer underneath the text layer. It should look something like this: 

Now that we have a background and some text, let's add a new layer. Click on the little icon at the bottom of the layers panel that looks like a blank piece of paper. If you have the background layer selected, it will add it between the background and the text layer (which is where we want it for the purpose of this tutorial). If you had the text layer selected, then the layer was added above the text layer and you will need to click on the name of the layer and drag to move it underneath the text layer.

Next, we will use a brush to add a nice little touch to the background of the siggy. Click on the "Paintbrush" tool (which looks like a paintbrush) and then go to the drop down box under the tools to choose a brush shape(and use the colors palette to choose the color you want). For this tutorial, I chose a brush called sparks (it comes with GIMP) and I left it on the default settings. Make sure your newest layer is selected and click and drag to "paint" the background. If you just want a plain design click once.

Okay, so now we have the design painted. It looks nice the way it is but I want to take it a step farther. I'm going change the "Mode" (the drop down box at top of layers panel, see picture below) to "color" which gives it a nice overlay. I'm also going to adjust the opacity(bar right underneath the Mode box) and change it to around 69% to make the design to blend in. This is completely optional of course. This is just what I felt like doing with it.
  

And you're done. This is the finished product.  

This is a very simple siggy but I use this technique all the time. Once you learn the basics, you're on the way to making really awesome siggys. The best way to improve is to play around and experiment with different effects. If you have any problems, just leave a reply here or comment on my page. Have fun and good luck!