Here is a button I made for my clan. We are just starting and we don't have a graphics artist, we have me. Here is an announcement button I made just toying around.


I made this a little while back when I ran an old site. The site is still up, but no one messes with it anymore. Here was the Logo/Homepage Graphics. Not sure really what you could call this, call it whatever.


This is an avatar I made when I was bored. It is simply designed and easily duplicated, but here it is. It is small, but I hope you can still see it.


This is one I am NOT proud of, but it was in the folder with the rest. It is garbage, but I would like to receive criticism on this so I can better myself.


Please feel free to criticize all or any you feel need it. I am new to this and I am asking you to do it!

Love it! You will learn, I just know.

Your images show that you do have an artistic eye, and I think with time you will develop that eye and learn some skills to make your images look how you want.

Your button, Announcements, I think the text could be just a little lighter to show better against the dark background; you have a good start on it. Since the letters are filled with a light to dark gradient, that may not work. Also, try a lighter drop shadow under it instead.

A Google search will find you web button tutorials that will show you how to add dimension to make it look rounded.

One suggestion is to be sure and save your images in layers in xcf format before merging layers so that you have a backup copy to go to if you want to change anything.

The best way I know to learn image manipulation is to keep on working at it. It takes time.

I strongly agree that you should save in XCF and save frequently. One of the very few problems i have with gimp is that it tends to lock on me and I lose everything unless I've saved it recently. I lost an hour's work last night because I got all involved and forgot to save it. Needless to say I cheerfully and patiently started over again. That's a lie, I ranted and raved and cussed.

Been there and done that a lot.

Good advice to save often. At least you don't lose everything and don't have to start completely over.

We need a built in mechanism that reminds us to save. Ctrl + S is quick and easy.

M3SH,
I also think you are doing very well.
On your last (bottom) one, I think if you bumped up or beveled your text to put some edges and dimension to it, it would give it a more 3D look.

Keep up the good work.

Ha ha , I've been in a similar situation myself.
- "We need a banner, who can make a banner?"
- "I'll give it a shot"

That's how I ended up with GIMP.

You'll learn a lot more, start to understand GIMP much better and make awesome graphics for your clan.

Welcome to Gimp Chat.

Oh yeah, I definitely save my XCF's. I normally save after I do major steps in pieces. I will list them like this annbut1-1, annbut1-2 and continue on so I know where to start off on one if needed.

Thank you all for the criticism, I do appreciate it and will use it for a personal gain. I will probably not mess with the last small banner I posted, but if anyone thinks or wants to mess with it, feel free to do so. I will post more when I get around to making them. Actually recently I did a mass cleaning and wiped most images I made off.

Also, if anyone has a good site to get rendered images, could you please pm it to me? I render some, but I am not that patient.

http://planetrenders.net/ this site is all about renders.

keep it up before you know it you'll be doing tuts on YouTube =)

thats what I like to do for my Youtube channel and tutorials on other things as well. I'm trying to edit my videos and find a decent screen recorder. I'm using Camstudio and Windows Movie Maker for now.