How to Use Gimp for Social Media

Once I came up with the idea to do a post about GIMP, I thought I would put it off for a few weeks. However, so many people have been asking me - how do you do that? So, I whipped it up today. I’ve also created some templates for you. That’s love.

Why Learn GIMP?

Remember when I said, ‘You need to create images as an indie developer.’ Well, it isn’t just developers who need to be able to do this. Lots of folks spend hours every week creating images from scratch, or they box themselves in a corner with limited applications. Here, I am going to show you how to create custom social media images from reusable templates in GIMP.

GIMP is a free and open source image editor. I :green-heart: GIMP. The platform is so flexible; my son uses it to create all kinds of art and animations. I have only scratched the surface of using the tool, personally. If you get excited about graphics, you can learn so much more than I will show you here.

Why use GIMP for social media

There are a number of applications that can help you make quick social media images. You can use the ones that you like. If you are not paying for most of these services, though, they own all of your images, and there are limits on what you can do with the images. If you are going to be serious and boostrapped, you need to find a way to create and own your own images.

You can get started using GIMP at no cost and on all platforms. It allows templating and saving in all image file types. It is open-source, so you can contribute to the code if you have great ideas also! Also, every one of your images is your property to do with as you wish.

How to do it

Get setup

Setup is pretty straightforward. First, you will need to download GIMP onto your computer. Second, download the templates that I have made, or construct your own from these instructions:

• instagram template - 1080 X 1080 px
• facebook template - 1200 X 630 px
• twitter template - 880 X 440 px

If you are creating your own, create new at the size given above. Create a background, an overlay layer with an opacity around 50%, and start a text layer.

Watch my simple video

If you cannot watch the video, the instructions are also printed below.

Follow these instructions

GIMP open showing three templates and both the right and left toolbars

• Open a template in GIMP.
• In the toolbar on the right, see your layers? Click on the Text layer. On the image, click on the text. Add some text in your Text Layer. It can be a quote, helpful tip, or whatever you want to say. If it isn’t working, look at the toolbar on the left and make sure that the giant A is selected.
• In the toolbar on the right, click and select your overlay layer.
• Go to Unsplash, do a search for an image, and find one you like. From the search page, right click and select “copy image”.
• Open your GIMP editor to a template file. Click Edit > Paste as > New Layer
• Your image will be in the top right of your template. Click Layer > Scale Layer - adjust the graphic here. I recommend changing it to 1000 width for all these social media platforms.
• Now, in the tall skinny toolbar on the left, click the one that looks like a blue plus sign, and move the active layer until the image is situated how you like it.
• You should still see extra dotted lines from your overlay selection. With the clipboard layer still active, Click Layer > Crop to Selection
• In the toolbar on the right, drag the overlay layer to be on top of (above) the image/clipboard layer.
• Now, you can adjust fonts and colors.
• You are finished. Click File > Export As > select a location and a name. Be sure that you are saving the extension that you want - a .png or .jpg.
• REPEAT

How to add credits. If your image will be stand alone, you can put credits right on the image, just add another text overlay. If you will have it in a blog post or another place, you can put the credit in the alt tag for the image or in the caption. Unsplash gives you the owner’s name for every photograph!

Where do I go from here?

Let’s take a minute to reflect on all that you learned here:

1. how to use GIMP templates to make social media images
2. where to find great images (Unsplash)
3. to use an overlay when your text fades into an image
4. to keep templates in different sizes for different sites
5. to save instagram images as .jpeg and others as .png

Go forth and make great images!

Also…awesome desktop wallpaper from TeeTurtle - not an affiliate or ad