A new development release for the next major GIMP 3.0 was released! Here are the new features and how to install the image editor in Linux.
This release adds a new way to change the brush size. Without going to the left “Tool Options”, user can now press and hold Alt key, then right-click and drag to resize the brush size on canvas.
Previously, user can use Ctrl/Cmd, Shift, Shift+Ctrl/Cmd, and Alt keys plus mouse clicking (e.g., right and middle click) to do some quick actions. Now, it’s possible to set custom action for these on-canvas modifiers.
To do so, open “Preferences” and go to “Canvas Interaction”. Then, click on “Click here to set a button’s modifiers” via any mouse or stylus button except the primary left key. Finally, use “+” to add modifier key (e.g., Ctrl, Alt, Shift) and select a desired action.
There’s also new setting options available in “Preferences > Canvas Interaction” to customize the zoom behavior either by duration or by distance, as well as option to adjust the drag-to-zoom speed.
The “Fill by line art detection” mode in Bucket Fill tool, now has more clear and easy to understand options. Previously, it has all the options under ‘Line Art Detection’. Now, it’s split into 3:
- Line Art Detection – to set which source to use? Using opacity or grayscale? Which threshold?
- Line Art Closure – for the closure algorithm of opened line art areas.
- Fill Borders – set how much grow size under the detected line art? How to get nicer borders?
There are as well “Automatic closure” checkbox to set Maximum gap length as 0, and “Stroke borders” which works similarly as the “Stroke Path” or “Stroke Selection” features.
This release also has imported CMYK support. JPEG now has CMYK import and export support. TIFF has 8 and 16-bit CMYK(A) export, which CMYK import is also possible. PSD also support CMYK import. And, there’s new plugin API to display or process CMYK colors in the context of the active image.
Other changes in GIMP 2.99.12 include:
- New “Custom checks” option in
Preferences > Display > Transparency > Check style. - Possible to rotate the canvas with a pinch gesture.
- New default theme with light and dark mode support.
- Specify number of repeat on exporting animated GIF.
- DDS with 16-bit masks, single 16-bit channel support.
- Export any bit depth as raw data.
- Loading WBMP image.
- ANI animated mouse cursor format support.
For more about GIMP 2.99.12, see the official release note.
How to Install GIMP 2.99.12:
This is a development release only for testing purpose! Don’t use it in production machine!
For Windows, macOS, and Linux binary packages, they are available to download at the link below:
For Linux, it’s an universal Flatpak package. In case your system does not support Flatpak out-of-box, follow the setup guide first. Then, run the single command to install it:
flatpak install https://flathub.org/beta-repo/appstream/org.gimp.GIMP.flatpakref
This command will ask to confirm adding Flathub Beta repository, then install GIMP Development version as well as runtime libraries.
If you also have GIMP stable version installed as Flatpak, only one will be visible in start menu though there are 2 versions in your system. Use either command below if you want to make a switch:
- To make GIMP dev visible, use command:
sudo flatpak make-current org.gimp.GIMP beta
- To stable version visible in start menu, run:
sudo flatpak make-current org.gimp.GIMP stable
And, to remove the GIMP development edition, use command:
flatpak uninstall --delete-data org.gimp.GIMP beta