Gimp Photo Editing

by Stephenie Gardella
(Dream Again Jewelry)

Using a few Gimp photo editing techniques results in better jewelry images. Necklace by Stephenie Gardella.

Gimp Photo Editing to Make Your
Jewelry Photos Look Professional

We all know how hard it can be for us, as amateur photographers, to get great, professional looking photos of our jewelry.

I have a few little secrets that have helped me with my photos immensely.

I am not someone who can take the perfect picture without needing to tweak it in a photo editing program.

I use a free, easy photo editor called Gimp 2.6. (Get the free Gimp download.)

gimp photo editing

Stephenie details how to use Gimp
to turn OK jewelry photos into great jewelry photos.

Here are my suggestions on
how to use Gimp:

1. Take as many pictures from as many different angles, with as many different props, as you can.

I try to take two pictures of each angle and with each different prop.

I usually take 20-30 photos of each of my pieces. This increases the chance of taking a good photo.

2. Make sure you have some type of light box for taking photos.

You can find articles on how to make a light box. There are also numerous articles on how best to take photos with a digital camera. This is the best way I have found to create beautiful photographs of jewelry.

3. Remember that photo editing software is used to more clearly and accurately show your jewelry.

You don’t want to over edit the jewelry, as then the photo may look different than the actual jewelry.

4. One of the easiest tools is the auto white balance in Gimp 2.6.

You open your photo in the image editor and then select Color from the toolbar menu and then Auto, then White Balance.

It is that easy. The Gimp photo editing program does it all for you.

This really helps you to get true and accurate colors in your photos. It gets rid of the bluish or reddish cast on the photo that can occur with inadequate or the wrong light.

Editing can help bring out the beautiful
true colors in your jewelry.

5. Next is the rectangle select tool in the toolbox.

It is the very first tool in the toolbox. You use this to drag and select an area of the photo. Anything outside of this rectangle will be cropped away.

After selecting the area you want to keep, go to Image in the toolbar menu at the top of the window and go down and select Crop to Selection. It automatically crops it for you.

This helps you to get rid of anything in the photo that is not absolutely beautiful. It also helps the viewer to zoom in visually on the jewelry piece.

6. Now you need to scale the image.

Go to Image in the toolbar menu at the top of the window and select Scale Image.

Up will pop a window with the image width and height in pixels. The width should be no smaller than 1000 pixels if you want the viewer to be able to zoom in on it.

Many sites like Etsy will resize the photos into thumbnails for you.

7. Saving your edited image.

Then another window will open up called Save as JPEG.

Check the Show Preview In Image Window. Then you can adjust the scale to show the quality of the image.

The greater the quality, the greater the image size. It tells you the image size in kilobytes (kb).

Most applications or sites want images sized under 100 kilobytes. I usually don't go below 75 on the scale. Any lower and the photo gets too low on clarity.

gimp photo editing

Chainmaille by Stephenie Gardella.

So there you have it. Gimp photo editing, done the right way, turns an ok photo into a great photo.

The images in this article were edited just as I described here.

Stephenie Gardella
Dream Again Jewelry blog
Dream Again Jewelry on etsy

Comments for
Gimp Photo Editing

Click here to add your own comments

How to use Gimp
by: Rena

Thanks so much for taking us step by step through your process of image editing, Stephenie!

You've just speeded up the learning curve for a lot of jewelry artists who'd like to improve the quality of their photos.

Thanks so much for sharing your Gimp photo editing tutorial with us!

Powerful Portrayals Picture Perfect
by: Brother David, FOSF

Wonderful and practical advice. I had been finding my photo editing softward absolutely inadequate to the task of presenting beautiful pictures. I can't wait to upload the great images that Gimp is letting me make with ease.
Br. David, FOSF
Rings Rosaries Jewelry and Things
http://www.brotherdavidarts.com

Gimp 2.6
by: Isabela

Thank you for sharing your tips. It has been very usefull. I will try with Gimp 2.6.
www.kukuibijoux.etsy.com

Using GIMP 2.6
by: Stephenie Gardella

Brother David and Isabela, I am glad you found my article helpful. Thank you for taking the time to comment. I really appreciate it!

Stephenie

30 - 40 images?!
by: Patricia C Vener

I wish I could take that many photos. After about six, my camera memory is full. And after I've done this about 4 times, my batteries need recharging. :(

Very helpful!
by: Joan Williams

Can't wait to try this out! My little laptop didn't come with an editing program so all my photos are "as is". The ability to make even small changes will be so helpful - thanks for sharing this info!

Thank you
by: Bonnie

Thank you so much for your tips on using GIMP. I have it downloaded, but have not used it as it seemed so diffucult, well you have helped that. Thanks again

Work on a Mac?
by: Diann

Thank you, Stephanie:

Before I download Gimp, can you tell me if it will work on a Mac? I checked the website and the webmaster is composed of volunteers who don't check their email very often. Thanks so much for your thorough explanation.

Gimp for Mac
by: Stephenie Gardella

I checked it out and it looks like you can download it for Mac OS X. Here's the link.

http://www.gimp.org/macintosh/

Gimp shopping!
by: Caroline

Hi Stephanie

Tried this right away, as I already had Gimp, just wasn't sure what to do with it. The auto white balance thing works beautifully, thanks! My pics look better already.