GIMP Version: 2.8.14
Operating System: Windows
OS Version: 10
GIMP Experience: Basic Level

List any relevant plug-ins or scripts:
None

List any ERROR messages you received:
None

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Hello folks, I'm hoping that I can get some help. I have a problem, and don't know how to solve it.

First a little background -- I've been using GIMP since June. Waaaaaaaay back in the day I had a friend who ran a graphic arts school and he gifted me a copy of Photoshop. We parted ways, and when my computer eventually died, i no longer had access to photoshop. The cost to replace was prohibitive, so I just moved on with my hobbies. But I've always always wanted my Photoshop back. This summer I was again wishing for my Photoshop, and saw a recommendation to try out GIMP, and even though it wasn't "as good as" photoshop, it did have good ratings. What I discovered was that the GIMP of today is about a zillion times better than the Photoshop of 1999.

So I'm extremely happy with GIMP, and have been teaching myself about it ever since I downloaded it. Still a basic beginner but learning fast. One thing I learned how to do pretty quick is make custom brushes. Since my current obsession is creating paintings like paintings in Egyptian Tombs complete with hieroglyphics, I've been saving each hieroglyph character that I create as a new brush, so I won't have to make it over and over again. Everything was great until one day I was looking for a symbol I'd created and used numerous times, but I couldn't find it. I looked through my 180+ custom brushes and didn't find it. Then I looked through them much slower. Then one-by-one, until finally I had to admit that it was gone.

So I made it again, saved it again, and decided that I must have accidentally deleted the file when I'd replaced a different image. I went on my merry way until suddenly, another brush went missing. ??? Huh? This time I was certain that the brush was gone. To verify that it wasn't a temporary glitch, I restarted GIMP. Brush still missing. Rebooted computer, Brush still missing. I counted the custom brushes (189 brushes) showing in GIMP then went to the folder for custom brushes, and sure enough, the numbers matched! So the brush was definitely gone for good. Since I'd made the effort to look in the brushes folder, I went ahead and backed up everything in the folder. Over time I continue to lose brushes. I thought perhaps it was that GIMP was saving them with the same name as some existing brush, causing the older brush to be overwritten, so I renamed all 189+ brushes so that GIMP wouldn't overwrite them, but still brushes are going missing. While I save them smart now (save in two places) I'd really rather have them all just work the way they are supposed to work without having brushes just disappear on me all the time.

I had downloaded a brush set someone else had created, and in my first attempts to find my missing brush, I deleted that set. But that did get me to thinking that one possible solution (if I can't figure out why the brushes keep disappearing).... The brushes I'd had for a while were in a single file in the brushes folder, but appeared as 50 to 100 separate brushes in GIMP. So while I would love it if someone can help me figure out what is wrong with my GIMP, and fix it, in the meantime, can someone direct me towards the correct procedure to create a single file containing all my custom brushes that I can put in my brushes folder and hopefully not have to worry about brushes just going missing.

I'm sure others will chime in here, but I have one question that might help solve the problem. Where are you saving/exporting the brushes to?

If to the global folder, you'll lose brushes anytime you upgrade the program. If to your user folder in .gimp-2.8/brushes then we are looking at a different sort of problem.

to Gimp Chat LadyLithia
Hopefully someone with Windows 10 will have some OS specific info for you.
Where are you saving your brushes?
My brushes are in sub-folders of [USER]/.gimp-2.8/brushes/

Thanks everyone.

When I create the brushes, I've been simply copying the image I created, and then going to the Edit --> Paste as --> New Brush. The brushes have been saved to my Users-->LadyLithia-->.Gimp-2.8-->Brushes folder where all the custom brushes go. Gimp saves them with "exciting" names like "mybrush389"

Since the brushes that have gone missing have all automatically been saved to this folder without me messing about with file locations and stuff, I think it's unlikely that I personally misplaced the brushes since the saving and location were all done by GIMP itself.

since GIMP saves them with such generic names, it's not really possible to search them out in my computer unless I just want to search for "mybrush" to see if for some odd reason Gimp has taken the brush from where it WAS saved, and somehow re-saved it to a new location.

Originally, since the names were so boringly similar I figured it was just a simple case of GIMP saving a new "mybrush389" and overwriting the old one. But even after I added a character to every name of every brush in the folder, I had the same issue pop up -- whenever I make a new brush, I can expect one or more old brushes to go missing.

Now I could go through and rename every brush with a new and descriptive name that is in keeping with the name I gave the brush itself when creating it (but which doesn't become the file name). But since we're talking about roughly 200 brushes, that would take a fair bit of time and effort, and with no guarantee that it would stop the elimination of brushes along the way, I'm reluctant to spend the time.

My next art project, which i'll be working on over the course of the next few days, will probably require me to make ten or more new brushes. Any suggestions on ways to track what I have and what changes as I make the new brushes? I've backed everything up now, and so if I lose more brushes it's not the end of the universe, it'll just be a pin in the posterior.

What Wallace said. Add-On Collection Manager you can't go wrong. Healthier for your GIMP, too, limiting the load time at start-up.

Also, the window for saving the 'custom brush' does allow you to specify a meaningful and relevant 'custom name' for both the brush and the file - albeit that GIMP may append extra numeric characters to the filename.

I also strongly endorse the recommendations from above members, to use Ofnuts Add-On Collection Manager.

Good luck

So I'm a totally ignorant newbie.... I don't mind adding the ofnuts stuff

So the question is where do I find it, how do I add it, and how do I use it?? (hopefully rhetorical, as I'll now go and try to figure those all out)

Okay so I think I found the page with the information about the add-on manager, but about 90% of what I see on the page is completely greek to me. Perhaps I should explain that I'm just a simple math teacher .... I used to be a computer geek once when computers were simple, but clearly I'm going to need help.

I did get so far as verifying that my version of GIMP should be able to take a python script. I just don't know where to get the python, where to put it, and what kind of mice it eats (or is it rats or bunnies?)

The page I found (I can't seem to be able to post the link I found... it's at gimp-tools, sourceforge, under managementtools) apparantly I'm too new to post a link. and under installation (to the right) I get lost with item 1... I don't know where the thing is that I'm supposed to install and 1. doesn't sound like a step because clearly I'm missing a step or a page or something. I can't seem to figure out what I"m supposed to download.... I feel pretty stupid.

For additional information related to addon-manager have a look at, Improved MrQ add-on manager and ofnuts documentation.

So I am feeling less stupid. When I got home from work today we had a 3 year-old visiting and I couldn't begin to figure out anything while he was racing around the house screaming at the top of his lungs, but he's asleep, and I went back to the page I mentioned before, and I've downloaded the .py file, I used the python to find out what the correct folder/directory was, and I copy/pasted the .py file to that folder.

So I got less-stupid enough to do that. Still not sure if that is enough, but guessing that there's more to it than that so I might snoop around a bit this evening, but probably will wait until tomorrow after work. I probably only use about 5 to 10% of the functionality of Gimp, so it would be great to optimize what I do use, and shelve what I don't until I'm ready to give it a try (and incidentally it would be great to stop hemorrhaging brushes willy-nilly... my latest project is calling for more than 10 new brushes, probably closer to 20!

In any case, I'll nibble away at this some more tomorrow, but at least now it's clear where I am, so if there are pointers where to go from here, you at least know how far I've gotten.

I'm in the Pacific time zone, and won't be checking back in until 4:30 pm or so Pacific time.

I downloaded (copy-pasted) the .py file to my plug in directory. Trying to follow some of the other stuff, in one link (to the Gimp topic about the add-on manager) it seems to state that my plug in directory needs the .py as well as a .ini file. Still not sure where th .ini file comes from.

Also not sure what to do from there.... but hey, at least I have the .py file where it belongs. I'm not a total idiot about computers... just deplorably rusty

And being a school teacher, I'm in the opening two weeks of the school year, which is when life itself goes into a tailspin.

but I REALLY love GIMP, and I need it now for de-stressing from my work day more than ever. So I'm determined to get this add on manager figured out. I'll continue trying to figure out what I'm supposed to do by looking at some of the linked pieces of information. Perhaps I can figure out what to do after getting the .py file into the plug-in folder.

Thanks so much. The brushes have all been saving successfully, showing in my brushes folder, showing in the brushes tool window, etc. The problem is that I seem to have gotten to the point where when I add a new one, an old one goes *poof* with no discernible pattern. I just don't know why they just go *poof* and would like to solve the problem entirely, or find a way to get my brushes into a file that won't go poof.

okay, so I feel like I'm still confused. On the Add On Manager discussion, the very first post states:



so.... this is where I'm stumped. I'm sure that step b1 might stump me too, but I'm alreaady stopped at A2.... the file I downloaded was not a zip file, it was just the .py file. There was no .ini so .... do I need to download that? Where do I get it, is it at the same place I got the .py file?

And because I know I'll want to know.... can anyone tell me what the very next step is after I figure out the .ini file?

Thanks bunches. I'm now going to go paint hieroglyphics (and save all my new brushes in two places, so I won't lose them when GIMP gets hungry for more brushes to eat)