Few questions about makin clothes

[Kolver]

Hello, I was hoping someone could help me out on a few questions I have. I'm kinda new to making clothes, well I know the basics to making clothes. My first question is how do you do trims and seams in gimp some of the clothes I saw them on be so real looking its amazing and also how do you make pockets for pants or shirts? and my last question is lately kinda been a war over photoshop or gimp a lot people been sayin if you gonna make clothes and whatnot get photoshop, but others tell me gimp is just as better as photoshop. Now I'm kinda used to gimp right now, but I have noticed everything for guides and stuff is in photoshop and I look around now that its around the hoildays things are a bit cheaper and I saw Photoshop Element 10 on sale I was wondering would it be wise to pick that up? Would it help in making clothes look better then gimp like more options or would I be better off with gimp? So any help with making belts, pockets, trims and seams and if photoshop element 10 is better then gimp would help a lot. Thanks.

[Peggy Paperdoll]

I will just add my two cents as the poster before me did a great job. I think the best free software to learn with which is GNU and all plugins are for free and can handle a PSD file with the PSD plugin is paint.net. Just Google it, and download it. It is very intuitive very powerful and used by tons of Graphic artists. It handles all file formats as well. I happen to think it is way much better than GIMP but that is a personal pref.

I would not start spending money on software yet. You have a long learning curve so go with the amazing amount of free software that is available. 

Good luck!

[Kolver]

Thanks guys. My main thing is though and this a more of a yes or no question and also for someone who will be working on clothes for a while maybe some posters as well as mesh clothes in the future is Photoshop Element 10 something if you could get it would it be worth it for those things? I know gimp have add ons for most part I know my way around gimp I'm just unsure how people make pockets/belts and seams so real looking. I can pay a few lindens for your trouble. I just want my clothes to be looking the best they can and if photoshop element 10 can do that then thats all I need to know.

[Peggy Paperdoll]

For system clothing (which any editing program with abilities to handle layers and alpha channels and save to an accepted SL format) Elements, GIMP, paint.NET, Painshop Pro (plus a few more, I'm sure) can certainly make belts, pockets, trim, buttons or anything you might imagine.  It can be somewhat difficult to make it look realistic but that's due to avatar mesh not being all that great.  It takes practice and experimentation to get it right.  I believe Elements 10 has a plug in (or maybe it's part of the package, I don't know for sure) to allow painting directly on a 3D model.......GIMP or the other free packages do not have that ability as of now.

 

For mesh you will need a 3D modeling software package.  Those programs are much more complicated (therefore harder to learn) than any 2D editing program.  None of the 2D image editing programs are suited for 3D modeling (mesh).  Again, you can spend a substanial amount of money for a program such as Maya or nothing for a program such as Blender or Sketchup.  Mesh is a completely different animal.

[Princess Verwood]

It is not as simple as a yes or no answer because while you may prefer one program, or one way to do something, someone else may like something different and can only tell you those things about that program or ways to do something from experience, etc. In other words no one can really tell you what to like or not like. There has already been some really great advice given! :matte-motes-big-grin-wink:

You could continue to work in Gimp until you get good at doing the things you'd like to learn. PS is expensive and it may take you more time than you want to put in to learn a program mostly all over again. You can create some really great things in Gimp as I'm sure you know.

As far as seams and pockets you can create this in Gimp by using the Paths tool. Draw out a path and click on "Stroke Path" within the tools menu to create different types of lines, line widths, etc. Seams can be quickly done by drawing 3 lines black, white, black around the edges of the clothing. blur them out to your liking. You can always create another layer and add more definite lines to create more look of a seam.

[Kolver]

Hey Princess Verwood, I want thank you for answering the seams and pocket question it really helped. I made a few great things so far and they sold very nicely on marketplace, but lately other places I talk to they want your stuff at photoshop lvl and even a contest I did I got my picture sent back because it wasn't at a photoshop lvl and rules didn't even say it have to be done in photoshop. So I guess what I'm trying say is I already done some pretty cool things with it, but even with that people kinda expect you have photoshop in sl.

Now, I did some looking around and saw it on sale and reason why I ask this question was because and also I was hoping someone who use Photoshop Element 10 (not photoshop) and gimp did whatever they make come out better? Was there more options for it? So really if you could own Photoshop Element 10 is that something you should think about gettin.

I know everyone say no gimp can do whatever photoshop can and also go look and find the add ons. I already done that and some of it worked some didn't. I wasn't asking anyone tell me what I might like better just feedback was it something to look into or stick to gimp or till you get real pro and have the money to get Photoshop. I asked wrong though I should've said to Photoshop Element 10 user how do they feel about it and if they still use gimp so that was my bad. Thanks everyone for taking the time to answer and if you a Element 10 user I appreciate any info you can give.

[Nefertiti Nefarious]

I suggest you take some classes in-world. there are some Gimp-specific ones.

It's not the software, it's the talent and patience and practice. I can only think of two things PS does that make clothing easier than with the GIMP - neither of them is a show-stopper. I use the Photoshop tutorials to see how it's done and then do the same things in the GIMP.

Photoshop Elements is NOT real Photoshop ... don't waste your money.