What's a good, free program to stretch an image?

[Dr. Drib]

That's all I want to do - just stretch the image somewhat to make it longer vertically.

Too: What's a good, free tool for changing the characteristics of ABC-Z letters? You know, rotating letters around and making one side larger than the other side? That sort of thing.


Thanks.

[crich70]

Originally Posted by Dr. Drib

That's all I want to do - just stretch the image somewhat to make it longer vertically.

Too: What's a good, free tool for changing the characteristics of ABC-Z letters? You know, rotating letters around and making one side larger than the other side? That sort of thing.


Thanks.

Windows paint. You can change the size of an image pretty easily with the resize option. As for the letters perhaps Gimp using different layers for the different size letters.

[GMcG]

IrfanView ist well known.
http://www.irfanview.com/
Image --> Resize
Unclick 'Proportional'
Insert the size.

George

[Dr. Drib]

Thank you for the suggestions.

I have irfanview, but failed to notice that characteristic.

[gmw]

I use Irfanview for most basic stuff - cropping, resizing and straightening images. It's "Auto Adjust Colors" feature is surprisingly good for a quick fix. For anything else I move up to the Gimp. But it's a hell of a jump. Gimp is a powerful product but is far from easy, and dealing with text I have found hardest of all. It will do most of what I've wanted it to do, but I've really had to work at it.

I've also tried Draw in LibreOffice - beyond the basic stuff they have "Fontwork", but I've found that to be confusing and limiting.

There is, however, another product I've been meaning to play with: Inkscape. It's a vector drawing program and my brother was recently recently using it to try and create a logo, he seemed to think it was not too bad, and some of what he was working with was text. It could be worth a try.

[Doitsu]

Originally Posted by Dr. Drib

That's all I want to do - just stretch the image somewhat to make it longer vertically.

If you just want to distort an image try Inkscape:

1. Drag & drop the image to the Inkscape window.
2. Distort it by dragging the arrow handles.
3. Export is with File > Export Bitmap > [Selection] > Export.

Originally Posted by Dr. Drib

Too: What's a good, free tool for changing the characteristics of ABC-Z letters? You know, rotating letters around and making one side larger than the other side? That sort of thing.

If you just want to distort/rotate some letters, you can also use Inkscape:

1. Create a text box and enter some text.
2. Select the text box and select Path > Object to Path from the menu.
3. Press F1 and either click a single letter do distort it by moving its arrow handles or double-click a single letter and then click the curved arrow handles around the letter to rotate it in the desired direction.

(If you accidentally click more that two times, press F1 to activate the Selection Tool or SHIFT+S to select the Rotation Tool.)

For more information on Inkscape object manipulation see this tutorial.

[Dr. Drib]

Originally Posted by gmw

I use Irfanview for most basic stuff - cropping, resizing and straightening images. It's "Auto Adjust Colors" feature is surprisingly good for a quick fix. For anything else I move up to the Gimp. But it's a hell of a jump. Gimp is a powerful product but is far from easy, and dealing with text I have found hardest of all. It will do most of what I've wanted it to do, but I've really had to work at it.

I've also tried Draw in LibreOffice - beyond the basic stuff they have "Fontwork", but I've found that to be confusing and limiting.

There is, however, another product I've been meaning to play with: Inkscape. It's a vector drawing program and my brother was recently recently using it to try and create a logo, he seemed to think it was not too bad, and some of what he was working with was text. It could be worth a try.

I downloaded Gimp last week. You're right: It's a huge jump.

I'll look at Inkscape, which I was not aware of.


Thank you.

[Dr. Drib]

Originally Posted by Doitsu

If you just want to distort an image try Inkscape:

1. Drag & drop the image to the Inkscape window.
2. Distort it by dragging the arrow handles.
3. Export is with File > Export Bitmap > [Selection] > Export.



If you just want to distort/rotate some letters, you can also use Inkscape:

1. Create a text box and enter some text.
2. Select the text box and select Path > Object to Path from the menu.
3. Press F1 and either click a single letter do distort it by moving its arrow handles or double-click a single letter and then click the curved arrow handles around the letter to rotate it in the desired direction.

(If you accidentally click more that two times, press F1 to activate the Selection Tool or SHIFT+S to select the Rotation Tool.)

For more information on Inkscape object manipulation see this tutorial.

Thank you.

I'm going to download that one.

You're the second person to recommend it.

[Matth79]

Another trick with GIMP - the "Liquid Rescale" plugin allows content aware resize - reducing / increasing areas with the least detail. Say on a beach with two people, the space will be adjusted between and around them.

Yes, seam carving can make some wrong assumptions, many content aware resizers add area marking to protect some parts from alteration, or to mark some areas to be removed - otherwise, it mostly goes on the amount and intensity of detail.

[Dr. Drib]

Thank you. I'll look at that one, too.

I've only barely touched the surface of this program. And sometimes (but based upon my lack of expertise/understanding), it sometimes doesn't do what I'm attempting to do.

[dwig]

Originally Posted by gmw

...
There is, however, another product I've been meaning to play with: Inkscape. It's a vector drawing program and my brother was recently recently using it to try and create a logo, he seemed to think it was not too bad, and some of what he was working with was text. It could be worth a try.

I just took a quick look at Inkscape. It certainly isn't as polished as the big guys (e.g. Illustrator, Corel DRAW, an my beloved old FreeHand which I worked on), but it seems competent. It allows for converting text to vector paths which can then be freely edited so it can fill Dr. Dribs need for text manipulation.