I was in need of a zebra stripes pattern, of which there were a few brushes and patterns available but sadly only one GIMP tutorial that involved drawing out zebra stripes with the Path tool. Nope, too lazy for that. So I sought out a reasonable way to do it quickly without all the fuss.

Disclaimer: No animals were harmed in the making of this tutorial, but also...this isn't a PERFECT zebra stripes pattern, either. So if what you end up with doesn't resemble anything remotely close to zebra striped fur, you could always use an existing pattern or brush, or follow this video:


(This is not my video. It was submitted by billps34.)

There are a few Photoshop tutorials, but the filters used for them are not similar to GIMP's. At least not in its entirety, to follow them completely.

The tutorial:

1. Open any size drawing. (If you're wanting something to be seamless afterwards, this isn't something that will work out favorably for seamless tiles, just so you know.)

2. On the patterns dialog, select the "Warning!" pattern. (Yellow and black diagonal pattern). If you don't already have it, you'll need "Scale Pattern" by RobA, install it and refresh. The script can be found here:

http://registry.gimp.org/node/13707

3. Right click the pattern in the pattern dialog box and select "Scale Pattern", and increase the slider to 300.

4. Using bucket fill with pattern selected, fill the image with the pattern. Go to Colors - Desaturate, and check the Luminosity setting. The stripes should now be close to black and white (more of a dirty white, which is "OK").

5. If you have a centered guidelines option in Image - Guides, use it, or manually create centered guidelines for the image, both vertical and horizontal.

6. Duplicate the layer/image (should only be one layer to start with) Now there are two identical copies. Flip the top layer horizontally, using the flip tool. Add an Alpha Channel to the top layer.

7. Using the centered guidelines to help you, with the Rectangle select tool, select the Left half of the top layer, and press "Delete". Merge the top layer down. You should now have an image that looks like this:



8. Go to Filters - Distorts - Wind, see settings below. You will run this twice, once for left direction, and again for right direction:



9. Go to Filters - Distorts - Ripple. I used the following settings. But depending on how wide or tall your own image is, you may want to adjust your settings to accommodate the image size.



10. For me, the black stripes weren't thick enough, so I ran Filters - Distorts - Value Propogate and applied the following settings:



11. Now, to break up the symmetry flow from using Ripple, I tossed the image into IWarp (Filters - Distorts - IWarp). And I used the following settings:



12. The final result was "ok" but I am still looking into how to better this technique, so the stripes are more random in nature. So, please, if you have a trick, please share it, so I can add it to my arsenal. I read online there was a zebra stripe user filter, but I can't seem to find it, and it's not in my guf folder.

That looks awesome! I will have to try that!

Pretty neat idea, and there's no way I could have used the pen tool and did what the guy in the video did. That's dedication to your zebra pattern there!

I gave it a go or two. Changed the contrast so my white was whiter.

The first one was a little too ripply.




Second try, I used the scale tool to stretch it out a bit before doing the wind and ripple. Made the stripes a little longer. I think I still did too much ripple, then overcompensated with the IWarp, so it doesn't quite look right. Also added some what I hoped was fur-like texture with Noise > Hurl > Desaturate > Motion Blur horizontally and changed the layer mode to something. Unevenly IWarped that too, you can see at the bottom middle. Kinda hard when you can't see what it's really doing :P



Had fun, nice tutorial!

Wow. Both methods are great. I, too, am going to have to play.

Keep on playing, Amanda, you're getting there.

I have two black & white stripes, seamless patterns that I'm pretty sure I made out of the warning yellow and black pattern.

They are the same except reversed.

The point of using IWarp, for me, was to make the stripes at least appear more random, because Ripple applies across the entire image too symmetrical for my taste. Photoshop allows you to counter this using twirl, which GIMP doesn't have. The G'MIC version of Twirl is not like PS, so it doesn't work the same way. I'm wondering if Crossover will work with PS 8 on Ubuntu, because I really dread using Windows.

I like your bottom result, Amanda. It looks like the front of a zebra, minus its leg and head.

I messed around in Solid Noise hoping I could come up with a quick way for making stripes. My rendition is only a suggestion. I think playing with it could get us some quick stripes. Mine is not good but it's a start.

New image. Render > Clouds > Solid Noise
X = 16
Y = 3.3
Check make tilable

Colors > Threshold
127 - 170

Use the Color Selection tool with the Threshold set to 30. Select the black area.

Select > To Path

Select > None

Fill the black and white layer with white.

Select > From Path

Fill the selection with black.



I don't think my zebra is going to win any stripes contests.

... nor is my tiger. Probably could warp those stripes before applying. Might help.

Started out with the diagonal lines and then did some twirl (G'MIC) and then a lot of work to make it seamless (Resynthesizer is my friend). Cheated with the fur though (used EyeCandy 3's Fur filter; lol).

Lyle, your version would be better if it didn't have such a wide fade-out blur around the black.

But my goal isn't to cheat with independent filters (although it would be cool to test them). I want to see what is possible within GIMP without any help from filters.

Yeah, but I love to cheat. lol

Maybe so Mahvin (the fade that is).

I know you love to cheat. I do, at times, too. (When time is of the essence). I did manage to get PS 8 loaded on Ubuntu and it runs ok, until I try multiple filters.

O: Did you try rotating your resulting pattern? Maybe that might help. I'll give it a try in a few.

Even though I cheated, I still used Rob's external program launcher (and XNView) in GIMP so it stayed in the family (sort of). lol

Can you try removing the blur portion? I would love to see it "tightened" up. It looks good, but the blur plays tricks on my eyes.

OK Mahvin. I have to add a complaint though. GIMP crashed twice on me this time (please release and fix 2.8 and make it 64-bit stable with all my cool plugins compiled for it). lol

Anyway, let me know what you think. I will probably release this one to Deviant too (yes it's seamless), but you all get the privilage of not only getting a better quality version (it's a png so lossless; will have to post a jpeg at Deviant since the file byte size is too big for the free account that I use there; lol), but also the first to see it (SSP time again; lol).

Yeah, now that is awesome!

Oregonian, your stripes look like they'd make a rough wood grain pattern, but only if the zebras don't like it

And nice stripes/fur Lyle, looks like I could reach out and pet it.

Thanks Mahvin; thanks Amanda. Yes, EyeCandy3's fur definite is what the doctor ordered. I almost can reach out and pet this one too.

No, not too big
the trick is that you may upload a different image for the preview and another file for download

So if you wish you may post a jpg for preview and upload a zipped (or better 7zipped 7zip really shrink file size) png

Of course would take more efforts, i 'm not pushing you to do it, just i wish to let you know in case you didn't notice that option

PS
cool texture

Didn't know that but, as lazy as I am, the jpeg's good enough. lol