I take it you haven't seen this. http://forum.warthunder.com/index.php?/topic/212752-f8f-with-error-in-tail-sectionwrong-modeled/
If you are having problems working with GIMP try Paint.NET http://www.getpaint.net/index.html It is paint with layers and good rotation. It is good for smaller things.
Why are you using Paint instead of the vastly underrated Paint.NET? It has things like layers, effects, and proper line drawing tools.
Anyway, making assets is possibly the most time consuming part of my workflow. Artistic prowess aside, it takes a lot of theory and knowledge to make assets that all blend together nicely.
If you use Paint.Net, you can use the Outline Object plugin by pyrochild.
After installation: Put the text to be outlined on a separate layer and make it white, then Effect->Object->Outline Object > Slide the Value slider to the bottom and slide Strength to Max->OK
MS Paint does not support tabs.
You can use the free program "paint.net", which does support tabs.
Please do not go to "paint.net", that's a website about...paint, the stuff the goes on your walls. The program is called paint.net because it's based on the .net application framework.
If you want a one time thing, just to get that sweet sweet look, you can manually blacken the textures. Just remember to save the alternate files and replace them when you're done.
Part textures are a special type of image file that most applications cannot edit. If you're looking for something free, Paint.net has you covered
Hey there, I have created a mod called Millennium Dawn that overhauls quite a bit of stuff.
While I have not created a real tutorial, I can only give you a bit of opening advice:
Get Notepad++ as a text editor, it's free and highly efficient. It will help you get through errors and find exactly the information you need.
Get paint.NET (link here) as an image editor; it is basically a better version of MS Paint, works quickly and straight-forward and is able to modify .tga and .dds image files, both of which are used in Paradox games, including HoI4. It is free and while the bigger artillery like GIMP or Photoshop of course can do the same thing, loading these up will get annoying very fast. However, be aware that you will need one of these highly advanced products if you ever want to mod a heightmap. You might not quite understand what a heightmap is right now, but just keep in mind that paintNET will not work on creating them.
If you have any questions, feel free to ask :)
MS Paint works. GraphicsGale is what I use and it can be used for free. GIMP, too, and Paint.NET. I've got a small list of other programs here, which also lists their cost, if they're free or not.
Give a man a fish, he can eat for a day.
Teach a man to fish, he can eat for a lifetime.
Give a man a net, he can figure it the fuck out himself.
Here is where you get a nice easy to use image editor (great for realm pixel art!)
Here is where you get photoshop
Note: Not trying to be mean, but give this project a shot yourself! ;) Having a basic understanding of graphic design is handy, and since you want a sig, its fun to design exactly what you want.
Why has no one said paint.net? Before I knew $10 a month for Photoshop was a thing, paint.Net was my go to, wasn't a fan of gimp
http://www.getpaint.net/index.html website is atrocious, the software is great.
PS: paint.net is am editor not a website
After a solid three weeks of work, I present to you yet another map of my world. But not just a single map, mind you, no this time I have added nation profiles. Little cards which give some detailed info about each country, complete with a simple map, flag, and metric units!
At the very bottom, there is a little table with some statistics for your statisticting pleasure. All maps were made in Affinity Designer (BETA for Windows is out now), and the elevation map was made with Paint.NET, and Wilbur.
Ask me anything. Feedback is appreciated.
At least in the program I was using (Paint.NET, which you can get here), the effect is referred to as "Zoom Blur," and can be found in the Effects tab under Blurs.
Even with GIMP, Photoshop, etc, I still use Paint.NET for quick edits; it's fast, light and functionally uncluttered. I love it, been using it for years. It's free. It's like the mid-zone between MSPaint and GIMP/Photoshop.
So that's my recommendation: http://www.getpaint.net/index.html
> plus Adobe seems to be putting weight behind it
Photoshop Express is already in the Microsoft Store. But, real Photoshop already runs brilliantly on existing Surface devices. Not Express. Photoshop.
(oh, and so does Paint.Net)
Paint.NET and the right plugin can edit and save icons with great ease, too (free).
EDIT: Oh, and IconViewer is another neat little tool to pull out icons, too.
Please don't tell me that took you 3 hours. I commend you for sticking with it that long, but please do yourself a favor and pick up paint.net - you can thank me later!
I've been building my own world lately, and needed a map to go with it. In comes donjon's Fantasy World Generator to save the day - It gave me pretty much all I could ask for in a world map. All I had to do was add the cities and territories with a Paint program.
Next comes paint.net, my favorite free paint program. I was able to layer all addons(such as roads and miscellaneous towns) separately, keeping the original map untouched while I doodle on top of it.
After adding my doodads to the map, a simple application of the Ink Sketch filter to the map's base layer turns it into something I want printed on glossy photo paper. I'll totally sell this to my players for a couple hundred gold.
What other free software do you all use to help create/organize maps and stories?
Or Paint.net. It's sort of like a mix between Paint and Photoshop.
I've been using it for a couple of years now and it's way better than MS Paint. I'm not an artist or graphic designer or anything, but you can get some good looking stuff with it if you mess around with the effects.
It's also free.
I like Paint.NET (Not a website, just written in .NET) for pixel art. It's like MS paint on roids, but not photoshop level. The perfect in between. Oh and you can easily modify it with C#(or I suppose any .NET language) if you need some sort of utility it doesn't provide.
There are free templates/lineart that you can use. This is quite a big collection: http://www.furaffinity.net/user/free2use/ (some is NSFW).
If you can find something you like, use a free image editing program like Paint.net to colour it in. Here's a tutorial on how to use it: http://www.furaffinity.net/view/14032815/
Configurable shortcut keys, automatic saving with timestamps, upload to Imgur, transfer to Dropbox/Office/whatever you want via custom commands, built-in obfuscation and highlighting tools (blur out sensitive regions, dim background, etc), all from one place.
Also, Paint is janky as fuck, use Paint.net at least if you still want to use a separate image editor. The person I was responding to said they had to take a ton of screenshots though and I figured having a tool with everything built-in would be a huge time-saver.
Not a mod, but I am going to answer you question as best I can. By standardizing on a size the banner size will stay the same even if the image gets changed with another one. They ask for a finished composed image, ready to be used in the banner. As most image straight from the camera is larger than your screen resolution they need to be scaled down. Photo's from a camera are usually 3:2, 3 times the width and 2 times the height. That would not look good in a banner as it's height should be much less than it's width. So you need to crop the image. Your original image should have had a lot of dead space on the top and/or bottom so that nothing is lost when you crop it. Any program that can crop/resize a image will have a option to save as png as this is a extremely common file format. Even MS Paint can save as png, but resizing and croping isn't that good in Paint. I am guessing no one is going to buy Photoshop for this contents, but there are other freeware programs. The most common would be GIMP and Paint.Net. Both MS Paint and Google Picasa can crop, but they don't let you predefine how large the are should be(in pixels, only ratio). Hope this answer your questions :)
Are you using photoshop? If so you can just use the magic wand tool to take away any space you want to be transparent and save the image as a .png
If you don't have photoshop you can use paint.NET it's free and it has the magic wand tool as well. Just adjust the tolerance level and it should take away space without the jagged edges.
Alternatively you can send me the picture that you want and I can do it for you tomorrow
In case you want to try a drawing application which actually does cover the basics:
http://www.getpaint.net/index.html
MS Paint is more like a practical joke. It's simplified to the point where even the simplest things are annoying to do.
There is no such thing as a free Photoshop package, the one bundled with Lightroom is $10 a month.
It's a different story if you meant to say a free image editor - take a look at r/gimp, paint.net and pixlr online. And Kryta also (mostly for digital painting).
MS Paint on Win 10 is such a hard freaking program to use. But here it is in all it's glory, completely in paint.
Hey I know just how new this sub is and, wow it's surprisingly far, but do we have a location will all the official stories yet? Either way thanks for making this happen mods!
^^But ^^honestly, ^^paint.net ^^vastly ^^better, ^^and ^^free ^^too.
http://www.dmlp.org/legal-guide/california-recording-law
If you have a small sticker/sign in the car that says "Please be aware that this car is equipped with a dashcam that can record audio for the drive and passenger's safety in case of an accident." Then you should be fine!
Use Lyft branding on it to diffuse any complaints, you can do this in Paint.NET in 10min
I'm a diehard Photoshop person, but I've used Paint.net before, and it's pretty comparable! If you do want to try Photoshop, it's only $10 a month through Adobe Creative Cloud. If you can make all your signs at once, it's worth it for a month or two.
The recent spurt in content has inspired me to make more content.
This drawing was mouse drawn using Paint.net, an easy to use free drawing and editing software.
Sure, paint.net.
And the empty map is here:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/df/Empty_Political_Map_of_Europe_iso3166-1.png
BTW if you tell me the countries and prices I could just add them to my map, no problem.
Uh, I'm not sure. I've just done a bit of research, and it seems to be just raster-based. The website for it is here.
The service 'inkscape' came up for a good vector-based thing.
It's useful for what I previously couldn't do (such as using different layers) to make posters more easily.
You could download Paint.NET (many pb-artists us this one), open your finished comic in that, click on adjustments then click on black and white. If you want to change it back before saving, just click on edit and undo.
Or use www.irfanview.com to convert the image.
I draw them with Paint.NET, and it usually takes a while to make all the component pieces for a new mapset (the props, buildings, etc.) - but once that's done, a map doesn't take all that long.
Try doing maps from scratch! I hadn't ever made a map before trying this one two years ago (and it was pretty mediocre), and in the time since then I've made a whole bunch, and some of them aren't half-bad. Having 100% control over your map's design is a great asset you can't really substitute for.
One other great advantage - one I've only recently been learning - is the ability to modify scale as necessary. It's easy enough to get caught in the trap of doing everything you might possibly want the players to see. Early on I made a full city map that players could move around on at player-scale, and that was a whole lot of unnecessary effort. If you're working a vehicle-scale encounter, you can design a vehicle-scale map, if you're working a city overview, you can do that. You can be really efficient with your time, and probably get away with one or two really nice maps for a single session.
Paint.net is actually the name of a downloadable software, not an online tool. You can get it here.
The name comes from the fact that it intends to be a replacement for the Paint program that comes with Windows, and that it's done using the .NET programming stack.
If you want a free one, paint.NET is good I am told.
Don't neglect using regular pencil and paper, though! Digital art (whether done with a tablet or a mouse) has its own learning curve, which might throw you off if you haven't done much artwork before.
I would also suggest giving the program Paint.NET a try! It's not as fully featured as something like GIMP or Photoshop, but it works well and is fairly easy to use. It should work for what you're trying to do! Here's a link to the website and a direct link to the download page.
Hi,
As free solutions the following will be able to create the assets you have mentioned.
GIMP offers a wide toolset, similar to Photoshop in many ways, and is a great alternative if you're looking for a no-cost image editor. The interface differs somewhat from Photoshop, but a version of GIMP is available that mimics Adobe's look and feel, making it easier to migrate over if you're ditching Photoshop.
Paint.net is a Windows-based alternative to the Paint editor that Microsoft shipped with versions of Windows. Don't let that put you off, though, as it's a surprisingly capable and useful tool, available completely free of charge. The software started out life as a Microsoft-sponsored undergraduate project, and has become an open source project maintained by some of the alumni.
Hope this helps :)
Just a tip, you can usually make pictures of drawings a lot easier to see simply by increasing the contrast afterwards in a photo editor. Paint.NET is a free, easy to use image editor that has contrast and hue adjustment capabilities.
I got a new computer at work recently so it was time for a new background!
After the 3rd co-worker compliment it occurred to me that perhaps I should share my method for posterity and future reference :)
At least 2. Probably more though.
I use paint.net Which is really easy to use, and very much better than MSPaint (plus its free). I'll usually set the canvas size to 5x9 and start drawing whatever pops into my head. I do this because when starting with a simple 5x9 your guaranteed to be able to make a good sized flag in minecraft without comprising details. Afterwords you simply re-size the canvas by 100 times, and you remove the blocky shapes to get your "official" pretty flag.
I use mouse like 90% of the time, but I do have a decent little Wacom Tablet that I love to use for initial sketches.
Pixel-art: Graphics Gale Masterrace
Digital painting: Photoshop (This is mostly where I use my Wacom tablet)
Anything else digital: Paint.Net or MS Paint
Vector art: Make my friend convert a bitmap I sketched up, into vector art. I think he uses Adobe Illustrator or something
If I'm just doing a first rough draft and it's temporary, I'll just use GameMaker's built-in sprite editor
Pretty sure you can download the pics, edit the dates and text with freeware like Paint.NET then reorder it to go from image number 3 to image no 1.......
Should be done in like, 5 minutes?
Edit:spelling cancer
~~I can't modify the files and then pass them on to you, because it's technically piracy and i'm sure the mod author wouldn't appreciate that. But I will glady guide you how to do it.~~ Nevermind, the author is totally cool with sharing his stuff.
First thing's first, grab BSAopt and exact the .bsa file the mod provides. This should give you a texture folder, and somewhere inside should be the texture files for the armor/catsuit. They are in .dds format, and you will need photoshop with the .dds plugin to edit them. Or use Paint.net, It's free and doesn't require plugins. Edit the textures to your liking. Make sure to save them as 'dtx5' and tick 'generate mipmaps'. I see there is a red style of the suit, maybe you can just lower the brightness/contrast and adjust the hue/saturation to make it purple. Then once done pack the 'textures' folder with the other mod files (.esp, meshes folder, ect) in a .zip and install it with your mod manager. There's no need to repack it as a .bsa unless you want to save a few .mb of space.
Never had real training. I was part of Newgrounds back when it was relevant and played around with Flash. After that, it was Photoshop and Gimp to make my MySpace page prettier than yours.
Now I just make fake album covers because I like playing with fonts. :-/
I pretty much use Paint.Net exclusively now unless I'm forced to use Photoshop if there isn't a plug-in to do what I want. I find it's a lot more intuitive and less frustrating than PS.
Thanks! /r/glitch_art has a good tutorial, but here's how to make this kind of stuff.
Open an image in the program of your choice. I use Paint.NET myself.
Save the image as a BMP (uncompressed bitmap file). You can use other formats if you want, but the odds of breaking them are much higher.
Fire up good ol' WordPad (Not Notepad!). Go to File > Open and select your bitmap image (you may have to change "Files of type" to "All Files").
Once the file opens, save it. Don't edit anything! You'll break it!
Close WordPad. Open the image back up to see what you got. Here are some examples of what to expect.
Touch it up a little, if you want. Not all glitch art is raw data.
For this use case, paint.NET is just about perfect. It supports multiple layers like photoshop and GIMP, but is much more straightforward than (at least) GIMP.
Sadly, it only runs on windows, as it uses Microsofts .NET framework, so if OP is on a mac, she has to look elsewhere :(
Well, Poor Man's Photoshop has a PSD plugin available. GIMP can open a PSD without external sources. The version of Autodesk Sketchbook Pro I am using also has native support for PSD files.
Get a tripod. Hands are known to shake. Any photographer will tell you that if you can't hold it steady, put it on something that doesn't move. You don't need an expensive professional tripod, either. Cheap ones work just fine.
Buy a book on photography. You won't learn anything by looking at other peoples pictures. They don't tell you anything. All you see is the picture and not what went into taking it. Bryan Peterson has some really good and inexpensive books that are worth looking into.
Take a photography course. Complaining about your own photos is useless if there's nobody to offer constructive criticism to help you perform better. I took a black and white photography course, with a darkroom, and I loved it. Having someone to critique your work so you can improve upon it is an incredibly valuable resource. If taking classes are out of the question, for whatever reason, head on over to /r/photocritique. The photos there are professional and intimidating and probably post-processed in Photoshop, though. You can always experiment with GIMP or Paint.net. They're both free. Don't pay for Photoshop unless you're being paid to use it.
Hi Palarme, I'm only mentioning this out of good spirit in the hopes it'll help a fellow artist (and also because you brought up the fact that you are using MS Paint as if it was a drawback).
Here is a list of a couple high quality free art programs that might help you the next time that you have a picture you want to draw:
GIMP stands for “GNU image manipulation program”. It's been around for ages and is a very well known alternative to photoshop. There is a large, supportive community that uses this program.
PaintTool SAI is a very basic but very well built program. You can use layers (which are crucial to many styles of digital painting) and the interface is super easy and user-friendly. Some of the more advanced features are very confusing, though.
I included this because it's kind of like MS Paint with the dial cranked all the way to eleven. If you're used to Paint and you want to get serious with your art but you don't know where to start and bigger programs intimidate you, this is the place to do it. There is a large community base that will help you with tips and tricks and get you set on the path to art-glory.
About your picture -- just keep practicing and you'll improve.
Keep trying! Hope this helps.
Paint.NET comes with a lot of different effects, plus there's a ton of plugins for it.
Example
Hi!
I drew this by hand (light sketch, then heavier pencil once I was happy with the shaping, then ink), then scanned it in, cleaned it up and coloured it using Paint.NET (available here, if you were interested: http://www.getpaint.net/index.html)!
If you don't mind the suggestion, I would encourage you to use the application paint.net next time instead of MS paint. It is pretty easy to pick up and you would have much more advanced tools and it would make your life so much easier for image editing.
You're absolutely right. At first I had solid-colored text blocks in there, but it looked like a comic book then. My graphics editing has never graduated beyond goofing around with Paint.net. I'm sure there's a way to easily do outlined text with it, and I should probably take the time to figure it out.
I updated the folder with the original .pdn file (Paint.Net) where the app icon box is on a separate layer so people can edit it any way they like. If you're not familiar with it, Paint.Net is a free image editor for Windows that supports some more advanced features (like layers).
I personally prefer http://www.getpaint.net/index.html as it's much better for editing on a pixel by pixel basis than gimp, and it's free unlike photoshop. It's sort of a common ground between the two of them and MSPaint, actually.
Maybe I can help! I goofed around years ago making some my very own Criterion cover art.
After finding a blank Criterion template (which is a lot harder to do than I remember, but here is a basic front cover) I used free Photoshop-like program called Paint.net.
It's nothing too fancy but it's pretty versatile and I've used it for tons of non-fake Criterion things over the years.
I would look on youtube for some free templates (or google search). Photoshop is a pain. For me, paint.net gets the job done http://www.getpaint.net/index.html
Since you don't want to spend money, just use a cool looking piece of art that you have the rights to use. Or like I said, find some royalty free template online. I'll PM you a guy that has some good stuff.
As others have mentioned Gimp will be your power user level application. However if you want something a little simpler and easier to use, give Paint.net a shot. I'd still suggest taking the time to learn Gimp long term.
Here's Sana cut wallaper. I edit it using Paint-net just like what OP used to cut his. It's free, easy to use and light. Btw already know this rainmeter preset before but I don't know what app to use for editing other than photoshop which i don't have knowledge of since I don't have any idea on how to edit pictures. Kudos to OP for sharing his tut and editing app :)
Yeah you should be good as long as your logo has a transparent background. (For it to have a transparent background it must be a PNG, PSD, PDN etc not a JPG or GIF) Also you need some software. Since you seem like a beginner (Correct me if I'm wrong) just use something free. I suggest Paint.NET. Its simply a more advanced version of MS Paint, but it can edit images with transparency and supports layers.
you cant, I am afraid. you will have to go to a slightly more powerful image editing tool.
Assuming you don't want to buy photoshop, there are 3 free options to consider: GIMP, paint.net and pixlr. pixlr is the odd one out, it is an online image editor, located here (you will need flash).
Paint.net and GIMP both have to be downloaded. generally speaking you can do more with GIMP and it is really customisible, but it is the hardest of the three to use well, with a bad user interface by default. so paint.net is probably easier if you just want to make a transparent color.
paint.net can be downloaded here
whereas GIMP can be downloaded here
Your drawing isn't too bad, however there isn't really one solution to improving it since everyone has a different style. I can only describe to you how I improved my drawing.
The program you use to draw comics can have a huge effect on how the comics look. Many people will swear by MS Paint, but you could also use GIMP or Photoshop. Personally I use paint.net, it has a similar feel to MS Paint but with a lot more features.
I find that using a mouse makes it more difficult to draw smoother lines. I use a laptop with a touchpad, which makes it far easier to fine tune your drawings. Thicker ball outlines generally make it easier to draw smoother balls, however I think well-drawn thin outlines look great, but that can be difficult and time-consuming.
Adding ball shadows isn't a requirement, and whether you want to add them or not depends on what you want your personal style to look like. If you want to use shadows, paint.net is great because of its layering function. You can draw the ball, make a new layer, set it to be transparent and draw a black blob where you want the shadow.
The comic that you drew doesn't have any major problems in terms of art, but you might want to improve your drawing of the USA. Remember that it has 13 stripes of equal width. It can be quite difficult to get them equal width, but as long as you have 13 stripes (7 red, 6 white) then it shouldn't be a problem.
Hope this helped!
If you download Paint.net http://www.getpaint.net/index.html (it's free) and then paste the logo as a "new layer" and then under the "Layers" tab choose "Layers Properties" and then under "Mode" choose "Multiply" and it does it for you. It's about a 30 second process at most.
you see i would, but i lack any creativity and i dont have photoshop, i have the poor mans photoshop: paint.net, which is pretty good, but a lot of the features that make photoshop cost what it does, are missing in paint.net. (in case you are wondering, paint.net is not affiliated with microsft and it is not a web based editor)
"Paint.NET is just about perfect ..."- Lifehacker (June 2010)
I used paint.net, which is free and runs on windows. The typeface used is Futura (same as original), which can probably be found somewhere. As for specific steps:
The bottom was slightly trickier:
[Optional] I used the clone stamp to cover up some of the artifacts from the original, to make the image cleaner.
Overlaid text (color was exactly yellow #FFFF00)
[Optional] In order to duplicate slight white on the border of original text (not sure if faded or camera error or ?, but I think it makes it look slightly more realistic), I created a new layer, copied the yellow translation, filled the bg with white and deleted the yellow. I then used the glow tool on default settings but with radius set to 1 px, and repeated once more. I selected the yellow text from the second layer AGAIN (NOT this layer) and then cut the text from the THIRD layer and deleted the rest, then used the new text.
Blanked text using sample tool to get color from bg of the black (Which was, I believe, about #101010), however since the black is actually a slight gradient it will look wrong, so use the clone stamp tool to smooth out the edges of the area you just filled.
[Optional] Lastly, to get the rest of the crease in the middle, I used the clone stamp tool again.
Merged all layers, and done!
EDIT: If you encountering difficulties finding a free copy of Futura: Bold Light
I recommend Paint.NET more than GIMP for simple image manipulation. GIMP is more complicated and has a learning curve, while Paint.NET is more of a replacement for paint.
Fiverr can be pretty amazing if you already have a specific idea and need help executing it.
GIMP is my favorite free image manipulation program, but can be pretty intimidating if you don't have any graphical experience. Paint.net is solid if you're looking a simpler option.
If you have artsy friends, ask them to do it for a favor from you (coffee one week, a pack of beer, something you're talented at).
One important recommendation though: a bad logo is worse than no logo at all. I've never seen a promoter or potential client throw out an otherwise good DJ for not having a logo, but I have seen press kits ignored right off the bat because of an amateur or otherwise poor logo.
Most people would recommend gimp, and that's a really good alternative. Personally, since I come from a PS background, I prefer paint.net.
Either one of those will serve your needs. Just google '(image editor name) nearest neighbor resize' and you'll be on your way!
*About UV exporting
Blender has a large UV toolset built in, you dont have to use blender to model, but I highly recommend you use it for modelling. There is a great community around it, and I just taught an IRL friend how to do the basics (what you want to do) in about an hour.
[if using sketchup] Go to file-export-3d model, then export a .DAE from sketchup
[if using sketchup] Import the DAE into blender using file-import-collada(.dae)
unwrap the mesh in blender (if you don't know how, use this nice tutorial)
Export the UV layout from blender
texture in your software of choice (i dont recommend using MSpaint, something like paint.net would better suit your needs)
I'll answer you in more depth answers to your other questions and give you more resources for learning blender when I get home in a couple hours.
I use Aseprite, it's a nice little tool made specifically for pixel art, it's got a lot of useful features and animation support.
There's also Graphics Gale, I've heard good things about it, but I haven't used it myself.
You could also use Paint Dot Net, but it's more of a general purpose image editor, not specifically pixel art. It doesn't support animation.
It depends on what you want to do, but generally there isn't a good free alternative. I ended up going for their monthly subscription service, I pay £8/month for the latest version of Photoshop as part of their photographer bundle.
There are a couple of options though:
GIMP - Open source image manipulation program. I've used this a lot to cut-up simple web designs, it struggles more when you come to image creation using paths, strokes, etc. This is the primary image editor on Linux operating systems.
Paint.net - Free (closed source) photo editor - has layers and so forth. It's Windows only. I've not used it much, but recommend it to friends who are doing simple photo editing - though I'm sure it's capable of much more.
I recommend picking up some better software for drawing in than MSPaint. I haven't used it myself, but Paint.net is meant to be very good, and it's free. If you can get a copy of Photoshop, you can't go too wrong with it.
Other than that, just keep on practicing.
Well... There wasn't much of a story to it.
I was binge watching Scishow Space and came across the video. When I saw the thumbnail I knew I wanted to make that joke. I searched the elements of the webpage for a direct link to the full size image, but with no luck. I fell on my backup method of finding the largest version of an image, and just used Google to do it for me.
The Yo Dawg image was easy, I found a version without a background and used Paint.NET to merge the two and posted it to imgur, and finally posted the direct image link here.
Customizing your list through CSS is actually really easy! Here's the tutorial that I followed to make most of the stuff. Other than that I just used a free program called paint.net to make the header and edit the background. It's a bit of a pain in the arse to keep all the pictures for every show up do date considering they delete them after some time of changing them but besides that it's takes no effort to just have it. :D
Hope this helps.
Also I'd really like'd you to read and reply to my bottom comment. :P
"I used to use Photoshop to do this but college is out and I have no facilities to that any more"
Free online photo edit:
Free photo edit program (download):
paint.net is the application name, rather than the site url. You can get it from here http://www.getpaint.net/index.html.
It is an excellent replacement for Windows Paint and for doing basic editing.
Paint.net is a really friendly and powerful photo editing software; and it's free too. It doesn't have the features of Photoshop (Which you can get a free trial for), but does have a lot of them, as well as the ability to get plugins.
Absolutely. Colored, Non-colored
You can download Paint.net to edit these photos, it's the program i use.
Paint.net is a simpler program, only problem is it can't open .psd files on its own. You can get download a plugin to try and make that work (although it sometimes has issues with large files), or open a ref sheet template in Gimp and save it in a different file format.
Here's a tutorial on how to colour in paint.net: http://www.furaffinity.net/full/14032815/
Lots of free line-art here: http://www.furaffinity.net/gallery/free2use/ (some a bit NSFW)
I personally use PaintNET but I know a lot of the pixel art community uses dedicated sprite programs. /r/pixelart's sidebar has some good tips on how to get set up.
"photoshop programs" <- Photoshop is one specific program made by Adobe by the way. What you are asking for is free raster image/photo editors. Be aware that none of them will be as good as Photoshop.
What will you be using it for?
Some options:
See what you prefer...
I made these images with paint.NET. Myslipox seems to no longer be active, but here is a link to his deviantart. (which is empty)
> I converted these files to .jpgs using DDS Converter
For future reference/anyone trying to do this on there own, paint.net supports .DDS natively if thats what you use for image editing.
Not sure about GIMP or photoshop though.
I don't know anything about Paint really, but some other programs you might find useful are Paint.NET (download it free here) and SumoPaint which can be used through your browser. Both of these have options that let you set the "canvas size" to dimensions of your choosing. (I'm asuming 8x11"?)
Use the magic wand tool with paint.net and then use the delete key and you have a transparent background. Paint.net is like an extended version of MSPaint (easy to use, not too many tools, simpler interface, etc). If you want to go Pro just download the free trial of Photoshop (They'll probably make you download CC 2014) or GIMP.
I am building this for a future D&D campaign. I have a large, overarching story-line written, but I hadn't made a world for it yet! So here is the beginnings of my world. I'm starting to fill in rivers and borders now as well creating culture zones. This world is almost fully populated though there is a very large undeveloped zone in the middle of the largest continent.
I used the Terrain Generator feature within TerraJ to first create the world. Once I'd found one suitable, I started using Paint.NET as my tool for filling in all the blanks.
Recheck the specs and details on the image file you are trying to use. Windows is very particular on image file size and dimensions on stuff like this.
The dimensions of the pic you need are around width 129 height 115 and it needs to be a .bmp image. In Win 8 the logo is not actually a .gif image. Its unmoving. So the Umbrella Logo that I linked above/below that was here, http://icemetalpunk.deviantart.com/art/Win7-Boot-Ani-Umbrella-Corp-187144249 will not work.
You will be better off using a static bmp file. Something like https://cheesybites.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/umbrellacorporation3.png Resized to be under the required dimensions and file size. And you need to convert this image to .bmp not .png
U can use PaintDotNet to work the image file or maybe even Windows Paint. http://www.getpaint.net/index.html
The weird textures in the screenshot is probably because you didn't delete the alpha channel (or convert it to DXT1 which doesn't have an alpha channel). But it's really simple to do. Download Paint.net and open the textures with it, then hit save (ctrl-s) and then in the first drop down box in the top left select DXT1. Do that for all the files you were suppose to.
Alternatively if you have all the textures in one place you can use a texture optimizer to process them in a batch and convert them all the DXT1. Probably would save you a lot of time.
SAI and Photoshop are popular tools for people doing digital art. GIMP(which is very similar to Photoshop) and Paint.NET(don't actually go to paint.net, go here instead) are also good alternatives. Mouse is okay for making stuff, but it's obviously not ideal. I don't know much about tablets, though I've been considering getting one, but I hear only buy Wacom tablets.
Unfortunately, I don't really know how to answer your other questions. Welcome, too!