With the spider, I'm going to get in nice and tight for the full booga-booga effect. I center and draw a 400x400-pixel box, click Crop in the dialog box, and voila, we've got our closeup, as shown in Figure G.

FIGURE G

Spidey-sense tells me this is a powerful program. Click picture for a larger image.

At this size, this image is suitable for displaying solid detail. However, maybe we need a thumbnail for a link, or perhaps we'd like a nifty buddy icon to freak out our friends on Instant Messenger. In either case, I want to shrink it down to 50x50 pixels.

I could resize with the Crop & Resize tool, but there's an easier way many of you are probably already familiar with. Right-click yet again, and select Scale Image... from the Image menu. Here we have full control over our Pixel Dimensions and our Print Size & Display Units, as shown in Figure G.

FIGURE H

I'm shrinking... Click picture for a larger image.

The units can be changed if so desired, but I'm going to stick with pixels. As with Photoshop, the chain keeps the ratio proportional (Corel PhotoPaint users will know this as the "Constrain Proportions" option). Simply type 50 in New Width, and the Height adjusts accordingly. Click OK to apply the change, do another Save As, and we now have two edited versions of the original image.

Piece of cake!

Conclusion
While hard-core enthusiasts or industry professionals may prefer to stick with tried-and-true products like Adobe Photoshop, the GIMP easily fulfills the role of a powerful image editor for the home user. And it's free, so you've certainly got nothing to lose by downloading it and giving it a whirl!

I also would not hesitate to recommend the GIMP for newbies. My own experience with the GIMP was certainly no more daunting than my first experience with PhotoShop, and because it's free, you won't have to worry about spending a fair chunk of change for a full version you may find too complicated, or spend less money and settle for a less full-featured package such as Photoshop Elements.

Michael Oliveri is a sysadmin for a small ISP, a writer, a Linux geek, and an amateur photographer. More information on his work can be found at http://www.mikeoliveri.com.