Gimp Tutorial - How to Apply Light Effects to Photos

This is a Gimp Tutorial. In this tutorial I will show you how to apply light effects to your photos. There are five different light effects that you can apply to your photos but you can change the five effects to create a lot more effects. I will walk you step by step through this Gimp tutorial. So if you are new to using Gimp, that's ok, you can do this too. Go ahead and open Gimp and let it load. When Gimp loads you will see a toolbar. You will have to create a new document to start working.

How to Create a New Document in Gimp

Go to the top of that toolbar and click File > New. When the window opens, enter the size for the document. 600 pixels by 600 pixels is a good size. Click the OK button to create the new document.

Now we will open a photo to use for the light effects. In the window that you just created, click File > Open as Layer. A box will open and you will need to locate the photo that you want to use. Once you have located your photo, click on it and click the open button. Your photo will open in your Gimp window.

How to Apply Light Effects to Photos in Gimp

Now I will show you how to apply the different light effects to your photo. You can use the same photo for each effect. After we have applied an effect, you can press CTRL Z on your keyboard to undo the effect. Then we will move on to the next effect.

FlareFX Light Effect in Gimp

Go to the top of your window that your photo is in and click Filters > Light Effects > FlareFX. The FlareFX window will open. You will see a preview window of your photo. In that window you will also see a cross. Grab that cross and move it to where you want the light to be. This light is really small. It is about the size of a pen point. Once you have the light where you want it, click the OK button to apply the light to your photo. This light effect is the least dramatic light effect in Gimp.

GFlare Light Effect in Gimp

To open the GFlare Light Effect go to Filters > Light Effects > GFlare. There are a few different effects in this window. You will see seven different effects in this window. Click through the effects to see what they are. Once you have found the effect that you want to use, click the OK button to apply it.