GIMP Version: 2.8.2
Operating System: Windows
OS Version: 7
GIMP Experience: Beginner Level

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Hello!

My goal:
Seamlessly insert this beautiful Wolf face (by Alannah Hawker at deviant art Your post looks too spamy for a new user, please remove off-site URLs.) in very small size in the left-top corner of this frame made of leaves, probably making the lower and left border of the wolf face be hidden behind some leaves (so that the wolf is actually part of the frame, the top-left corner of the frame).


This will be a frame for a plastified Post-It saying "I love you , Dario" that I will gift a girl with (plastified in hard plastic so she can carry it around in her purse or wallet without destroying it)

Progress Report:
1) Set GIMP language to English - at gimp's documentation Your post looks too spamy for a new user, please remove off-site URLs. - DONE!
2) Resize leaf-frame down to fit wolf face size better - DONE!
3) Resize Canvas to fit huge leaf-frame image...

Current situation/hurdle:
- The wolf image is set as background layer
- The leaf-frame image is a "floating selection" layer
- The Canvas is as large as the leaf-frame image
- The leaf frame image only shows where it intersects with the smaller wolf image... What do? I would like to see everything, should I set a new empty background layer that is as large as the leaf-frame?
- Following the "Beginning with GIMP -- Starting Tutorial for new users" I would like to customize my layout, but I'm failing at getting the Toolbox-Tools dock window to dock with the Layers-Brushes dock window.. , halp

I don't understand your question. Are you saying you want the leaf frame to go around the wolf?
Move the bottom layer up one and make the wolf the bottom layer.

the leaf picture is much bigger in comparison to the wolf picture

so you need to scale down the leaf picture with the scale tool

my recommendation:
open the leaf picture and scale it to 800x542
then go to file -> open as layer and choose the wolf picture
then put the wolf-pic layer under the leaf-picture

the leaf frame has already transparency because it has an alpha channel, and everything but the leafs is transparent, that makes it all easy
your wolf-pic doesnt have an alpha channel, so it might come handy if you add one
click on the wolf-pic in your layers-dialgoue and right click: add alpha channel

Molly, I edited the 1st post to make it clearer:
Seamlessly insert this beautiful Wolf face (by Alannah Hawker at deviant art Your post looks too spamy for a new user, please remove off-site URLs.) in very small size in the left-top corner of this frame made of leaves, probably making the lower and left border of the wolf face be hidden behind some leaves (so that the wolf is actually part of the frame, the top-left corner of the frame).

you can downscale the wolf-pic any size you want, but if you want it smaller, you will need another background and probably erase parts of the wolfpic, for that it needs to have an alpha channel as i explained in my previous post

Thanks Esper , I've added an alpha channel to the wolf image ^_^
I've tested down-scalling the leaf-frame, and came to the conclusion that the original sizes are better suited to my needs (I want them to be the original resolutions for better quality printing later)

Graechan, the current xcf is 10MB (which apparently is bigger than the The maximum size: 5242880 bytes )
Let me make a down-sampled version so I can upload it

EDIT: down-scaled (albeit xcf is not in the Available extensions: gif, jpg, jpeg, png, apng, bmp, tif, tiff)
The upload extension xcf is not allowed

you can always zip an xcf-file to make it smaller before attaching

if you scale down the pic as i suggested, printing size will be 6,77 x 4,64cm says XnView

Is it something like this you want but in a larger scale?

Esper, his leaf pattern did have an alpha channel but he also had a white layer below it. according to when I download it, it was transparent.

Here's a quick one to use as a reference to more of this or less of that.

Hi molly

Not quite ^_^,
I wish to insert the Wolf face in very small size in the left-top corner of this frame made of leaves, so that the wolf is actually part of the frame, the top-left corner of the frame.
In the middle of the frame there will be a Post-It saying "I love you , Dario"

Something like this but better:


So, next step, cut the face of the wolf image?

O, ok, I get it. so all the center part of the frame with be empty You just need to select the head with the elipse tool or the rectangle and copy > paste as new layer, put your text in the size and color you want then merge the three together.

If you look at my sig, the merry Christmas is one layer, the benji Macy is one layer and the cats are one layer. that is 3 separate layers. use the move tool to place them where you want, then merge. the animation layers are not included

My current hurdle:

- Used the free select tool to loosely select the wolf face, and Copy
- Unable to make only that selected face appear
--- Tried: created new layer and pasted selection there - didn't appear visible (could only see the outline of the selection and not the face itself)
--- Did the "Paste as New Layer", the layer appears, but only the outline of the selection is visible (and in the meanwhile I made the original wolf invisible by clicking the eye button of it's layer)
Oh wait I see it now


Next step "cut wolf-face better?" maybe make the borders of the face fade to white? or fade to transparent? (How to?)

You could have cut out your head with the elipse tool, make it round or oval, feather about 20 or 30 then delete. that should make the edges fade out. I will have to try one and see what happens or just play with it and feather different numbers till you get it to your liking.

I could have done a better job on this if I took more time but I think shrinking and feathering might do the trick.

! Thank you Molly,

feather edges 20 radius looks awesome (still cutting it with the lasso tool)



hmmm, now I wanted to delete a few of those top-left leaves so that the wolf is more in the corner
What do you suggest, just lasso them out?

select the leaf layer and carefully use the erase tool and erase the leaves you don't want showing.

*confused*
selected wolf layer, selected Eraser Tool, selected "1 Pixel" brush,
click on leaf; keep clicking; clicking and dragging; shift click; clcickcickckckckc
no visible effect O_o (in the "Undo" tab lot's of "Eraser" actions show up)

selected the leaf layer, click on leaf; keep clicking; clicking and dragging; shift click; clcickcickckckckc
no visible effect O_o (in the "Undo" tab lot's of "Eraser" actions show up)

Halp what's up?

EDIT
what below refer to your previous version, the last is much better , still i believe will look better with the wolf a bit bigger and cutted just under the nose (as the face was popping out from there,)
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well there on the top left the wolf doesn't look well because the cut just below the head,

the problem is not only the black line you left on the lower part of wolf neck, even removing that will look as a sewered head, sure adding some fog or more leaves there may minimize the effect but i fear you should revise the concept

It happens also to me often , some idea may look cool but then the practice shows that should be modified

If you really want that i believe you should at least remove also the neck...we are used to see faces but a face with a truncated neck looks as beheaded

Go to select and click none, you might still have something selected.
I also agree with PC. the wolf will look much better with a neck. Make him large, do the feathering then shrink him down to what looks best. select Leaf layer to do the erasing, not the wolf layer.