How to Create Steampunk Photography Using Gimp

This updated guide examines How to Create Steampunk Photography Using Gimp and organizes the essential facts, background, and practical takeaways in clear American English.

Method 1of 2:

Using Pre-Built Effects

1. Pick out a photo. A photo of anything steam-powered is appropriate, of course, but you can also play with images of gears, airships, hot air balloons, and anything mixing Victorian elements with mechanical technology.
2. Install GIMPif you haven't already.
3. Apply the Old Photo filter(Filters > Décor > Old Photo). This border size has been decreased a bit (the default value was a bit too large for the image).
   • Decide if you want to let Defocus on after reading the next few steps. In this example, it was left on, as it is the default.
   • And instantly we have an old looking photo.
   • You can leave it as it, but if what you want is a steampunk image, read on.
4. Adjust the curves. Adjust the color curves to make it more vivid.
5. Sharpen the image. The defocus option in applying the filter was a nice touch in making the photo look old, but you want to experiment with taking it into the opposite direction and apply a heavy sharpen.
6. Add a few coffee stains(Filters > Décor > Coffee Stain) to the photo (accidents happen with old photos, after all). The stains are drawn randomly, so try a few times until you get something you like.
7. Here's the final result, which we obtained only with pre-built effects.

Method 2of 2:

Beyond the Basics

1. Start with the original photo. Sure, applying the sepia effect automatically was easy, but with manual control we can get something much better, so let's redo that step manually.
2. Turn it into black and white(a quick way is to desaturate it - Colors > Desaturate, but you can also use convert to grayscale and then back to RGB).
3. Select a light brown as foreground (painting) color, add a new layer, fill it with that light brown.
   • Optionally rename the layer "sepia" to help you identify it.
4. Add a Layer Maskto the brown layer and leave it white (full opacity).
5. Nowgo to the background(photo) layer, select everything, go back to the sepia layer, select its mask and paste (paste into the mask, not into the image layer).
6. Anchor the selection.
   • The result will look funny, but do not get scared, it's ok.
7. Justchange the layer modefrom "Normal" to "Color".
   • And you will have a good looking sepia image.
8. Merge the layers.
9. Add a border. Use the Fuzzy Border filter (Filters > Décor > Fuzzy Border).
   • Take care to select a good color for it (use the color picker and take a sample from the picture) and a good size.
   • And the result is something like this.
10. If you want to defocus, add a little Gaussian Blur or if you want to go the opposite way, just sharpen it.
11. You can also play with the Color Curves.