Mora Foto, Gimp tutorials for photo editing

Sunday, December 21, 2025

Mora-Foto: tutorials for photography, Gimp and more

Hello everyone!

Today marks the end of an era: after a good fifteen years of service, we have decided to suspend the domain www.mora-foto.it. This decision is not a goodbye, but a step towards a bigger future! Our energies are entirely dedicated to the new, ambitious project: www.ciaocortina.com, the unofficial tourist guide for discovering Cortina d'Ampezzo!

On the new site, you will find all the photography content you loved on the old one. As for the articles that do not fit the new project, we have moved them here on Blogger, where you can consult them as long as the service is available. To make navigation easier, here are all the pages you can find on the blog:

Gimp Tutorials:

Basic Gimp tutorials

Light and exposure

Manage colors

Enhance a photo

Improve eyes looking

Improve the panoramas

Artistic Use of Blur

Gimp Plugins

Advanced Gimp tutorials

Effects

Photography guides:

Practice of photography:

Gimp tutorial for a perfect white balance, both automatic and manual. Use the right white balance is extremely important to get the correct colors on a photograph.

The white balance is the correction of the color dominants of the light source in a photograph. Gimp, allows us to balance the colors of an image automatically or manually. If you are interested in this topic, I invite you to also read our white balance tutorial in the photography section, because is more about the theory. This tutorial is more practical.

White balance "Sunlight"

White Balance "shadow"

There are some rare cases we find ourselves taking a photograph in very particular light conditions, or we may have forgotten active a wrong white balance setting, compared to what we are photographing. If you shoot in RAW format this problem does not exist, as you can correct the white balance during the development of the raw file, but with a compressed photo, as jpg, you need to do some photo editing.

In the example picture, the balance was set to "Day", but the correct setting would have been "shadow". All tones have a strong blue dominant, as sunlight (with its characteristic yellow colour) does not directly illuminate the scene.

Gimp automatic white balance

With the function Colors → Auto → White balance our beloved Gimp will automatically correct the colors according to a mathematical calculation, with a satisfactory result most of the times. In photo editing it is important to apply the automatic white balance first of everything else, because if you apply an automatic white balance after having already contrasted and saturated the photograph, the results will be worse. The auto white balance creates a strong increase in contrast, so if you have a photograph already strongly contrasted, or if you want to keep the shades softer, you'll have to do it manually.

Once you have done an automatic white balance, the image should already look correct. In our case the result, which we'll see very soon, was still slightly too blue. To manually adjust a slight dominant color, we can use the less aggressive function Colors → Color Balance, where to reduce an excess of blue we increase its opposite color, which is yellow. The same reasoning applies to all the other colors that could be present. The selection of mid-tones, highlights or shadows allows us to work only on a certain range, e.g. we could remove the blue from the shadows or emphasize the red, but only on the highlights, on a sunset. Personally, I always recommend to start with half tones, then correct, only if necessary, also highlights and shadows.

Alternatively, if you want to work in the entire image, it might be very useful to use the tool Colors → Color temperature, where you'll find a slider to correct the image with the desired color temperature.

Remember that Gimp helps us to correct an error, but it would be better to shoot with the correct white balance. Over edit a file often results in a deterioration of the image as a whole. Below you can see the result before and after auto white balance with also the color correction.

Before Gimp auto white balance

After Gimp auto white and color balance

The Color Balance tool can also be used to colorize an image. Apply a +10 of blue to a photograph of ice in winter could improve the sensation of coldness, as a +10 of red could give to a sunset a tone that the camera could have missed. I suggest you to experiment with different solutions, and try to emphasize the dominant colors in some cases.

+ 10 Magenta

+ 10 Blue

Gimp manual white balance with color levels

An alternative method that we can use to correctly adjust the White Balance is to use the colors levels, adjusting the histogram separately for the three color channels. Consider that this method is not infallible, but many times it allows us to find color dominants that risk going unnoticed.

To be able to do follow this tutorial you need to have a clear understanding of what the color histogram is, and how to use the Gimp color levels, if you have no experience with it I invite you to read first our Gimp histogram and color levels tutorial.

In the example picture, it is almost impossible to see the correct white balance. This is a photograph taken in the shade and exported with tungsten white balance, so with a strong blue dominant that is partially hidden by the lack of references and purplish tones of the flower. First we open the tool Color → Levels, then we select the color channel from the drop-down menu. For the moment we'll just watch all three channels (red, green and blue).

What we need to do is try to optimize each channel's histogram. Take the arrows below each histogram, these must be adjusted so that each chart is perfectly enclosed within them. Let's tighten them as in the example image. To do this, I recommend that you enlarge the work window as much as possible so that you have the best possible visibility. If small isolated lines appear, I suggest you to ignore them and cut them out till the histogram start to be continuous.

As mentioned earlier, this method is not infallible, but many times it allows you to have the vision of dominants who might go unnoticed. In the example image used before, there was a very present blue veil, which was completely eliminated by the correct histogram adjustment, as we can see below. On the left I published the photograph corrected with histograms, on the right is the one with Gimp's auto white balance.

With manual white balance

With automatic white balance

If you liked this tutorial here you can find all the tutorials we wrote about editing with Gimp, or you can all the guides we have written about photography in general. If you liked our work, you could consider to ❤support us by clicking here you can see how.

Gimp Tutorial: Two-Color Technicolor

How to use Gimp to simulate Two-Strip technicolor. In this tutorial we'll create an effect that simulates the first technicolor movies with Gimp.

In this Gimp tutorial we will recreate the Two Strip Technicolor. It is the wrong, but widely used, name of "Two-color Technicolor Process 2 Bi-pack" that was one of the many technologies that were used in Hollywood from 1922 to 1952 in order to get color movies. Gimp allows you to recreate the Two-Strip Technicolor effect in two ways; Red/Cyan and Red/Green. The effect is more realistic with Red/Cyan tones even if the original technique involved Red/Green filters.

Without Two Strip Technicolor

With Two Strip Technicolor

The result we want to get is a loss of most of the color tones of the image, something similar to the next screen capture of an original movie by Michael Curtiz of 1933, called "The Mystery of the Wax Museum".

The two-strip technicolor gives the best results if your photo looks an old one, so I decided to use this photo of a commemoration of an old bobsleigh team, taken during a traditional parade here in Cortina d'Ampezzo.

First of all, you need to duplicate the current layer. You have to move the mouse cursor over the actual layer on the Layers window (press Ctrl+L if you can't find it) then click Right Mouse button and choose Duplicate Layer.

Next step is to create a new blank layer: place your cursor on the Layer window, (press Ctrl+L if you can't find it) then click Right Mouse button and choose New Layer. Default settings are perfect, so simply press Ok when you have to choose the new layer properties.

Select the Bucket Fill Tool, then click on the active foreground color to change it, and set ff0000 in the HTML notation, press Ok and click anywhere in the image to fill the New Layer with a plane red color.

Now we need to merge down the layer on the top: on the Layers Window select the upper layer, then choose Multiply as Blend mode, and leave opacity to 100%, then click with the right mouse button on the layer on the top and choose Merge down.

Hide the red layer by clicking the little eye icon on the left of the Background Copy layer, with the Left Mouse button so we can work on the lower layer.

Next step is to create a new blank layer: place your cursor on the Layer window, (press Ctrl+L if you can't find it) then click Right Mouse button and choose New Layer. Default settings are perfect, so simply press Ok when you have to choose the new layer properties.

Select the Bucket Fill Tool, then click on the active foreground color to change it, and set 00ffff in the HTML notation, press Ok and click anywhere in the image to fill the New Layer with a plane cyano color.

Now we need to merge down the layer on the top: on the Layers Window select the upper layer, then choose Multiply as Blend mode, and leave opacity to 100%, then click with the right mouse button on the layer on the top and choose Merge down.

Now you have to desaturate the colors by clicking Colors → Desaturate → Desaturate.., select Lightness HSL as Mode, then press Ok. Attention: This step seems strange, why should you desaturate the cyan color you have just created? I know, it's strange, but is fundamental to get the two-strip technicolor.

Now choose Colors → Colorize and press OK leaving everything as default.

The last step for this two color technicolor tutorial is to unhide the Background copy Layer, clicking in the place where there was the little eye icon few steps above, then select Difference as Blend mode, leave 100% of opacity, then click with the right mouse button on the red layer and choose Merge down.

Next you can see the result you should get, notice that the green tones are completely gone. The result could be even better if you enhance the saturation of the image. I also duplicated the image, applied a Filter → Noise → RGB noise, then I blurred the image Filter → Blur → Gaussian Blur and merged the noise and blur layer at 30% of opacity, finally I contrasted the image with Colors → Auto → White Balance.

Without Two Strip Technicolor

With Two Strip Technicolor

If you liked this tutorial here you can find all the tutorials we have written for photo retouching with Gimp, or you can all the guides we have written for photographic technique. If you liked our work, you could consider to ❤support us by clicking here you can see how.

Expose to the right of the histogram

Analysis and considerations on the "exopose to the right" theory in digital photography.

On how important is to expose to the right of the histogram you will find rivers of words and many articles for or against. Our point of view is not so authoritative, but we are convinced that is a valid theory. Not fundamental, but correct. We have therefore decided to write this article to analyze in depth the advantages and disadvantages of exposing to the right of the histogram and try to explain why we almost agree. Surely it made sense to deepen with practical tests our feeling. In this article we will also explain some concepts that are very important for the beginners who want to approach to the world of digital photography, so it made sense to write it. Let's start.

Important premise, what is the histogram?

In almost all cameras you can see the histogram of the photograph in the preview display, knowing how to read it is a fundamental thing to understand what is meant with expose to the right.

The histogram is in fact a graphical representation of the amount of pixels that make up the image and their respective "brightness". If you didn't understand anything, we wrote a much more in-depth and easy to understand article on histogram, which you can find here.

There are two types of histogram: one in which you can see all colors separately, below left, or the generic brightness value, down here on the right. Usually we tend to use the one on the right for ease of reading.

Although we recommend reading the tutorial linked above, we will quickly review the concept. To learn how to read a histogram it is enough to understand that on the left are the dark areas of the photograph, in the middle the half tones and to the right the highlights. The height of the graph is determined by the number of pixels present in that particular tone. Below I will try to explain better by developing the same photograph with two different exposures and associating to each of them the relative histogram.

As you can see, the dark picture has the graph moved to the left and has the area of the highlights (on the right) completely empty, as there are no bright areas in the image.

To sum up the concept to the bone, a properly exposed and contrasted photograph has a histogram uniformly distributed over the entire width, a dark photograph will have a compressed histogram on the left. A bright photograph will have a histogram compressed on the right.

Why should you expose to the right?

The ETTR is an acronym for "Expose To The Right", a concept that was introduced by Michael Reichmann, the publisher of Luminous Landscape, in this article that was a huge success among photography enthusiasts. It must be said, however, that this technique also has many detractors which don't deny the validity of the theoretical assumptions, but sometimes question their practical benefits.

Expose to the right-means that we should set our camera to manual, trying to keep the histogram as moved as possible to the right, in the high lights, without burning out them. Photos taken according to the logic of right exposure may be too bright. We must then edit the file generated with our digital development software in order to restore brightness and contrast to the ideal conditions. Obviously all of this makes sense only and exclusively if we go to take the photo in RAW format. You can read a tutorial here if you do not know the meaning of the terms "shoot in RAW format". As already explained, it is essential to not to have any clipping in highlight, otherwise we're going to lose important information, as we can see in the following example, where the clipping on highlights in blinking red.

The inspiration for writing this article came from the post of rs232, a user of the italian Forum zmPHOTO that made us discover this topic by writing: "Why should work this seemingly useless game of deliberately overexposing the photo on the field and then correct it in the development of the RAW file? To answer this question we should know something about the digital representation of the signals (...) we just need to know that the values on the right of the histogram - i.e. those closer to white - are favoured over those on the left and therefore move the histogram to that area means being able to record the maximum number of details while keeping the noise for all ISO values to a minimum. (...) Exposing to the right makes better use of the resolution of the camera's Analog to Digital converter".

To summarize, expose to the right is a way to take full advantage of the technical features of digital sensors, which store information in a way that is more efficient on high lights than on shadows. In other words, it is more efficient to recover the highlights rather than the shadows, to not compromise the image quality. As long as the high lights aren't burnt out, of course.

How to expose to the right in practice?

Because setting up the camera correctly is not a thing you can do in two seconds, we recommend to use this technique mainly in the panorama photographs, or anytime you have enough time to adjust the exposure without the risk to lose the subject or the moment. Do not forget that in some cases it is necessary to be fast, and exposing to the right leads inevitably to longer times.

To expose correctly to the right simply set the camera to manual and set the shooting parameters (shutter speed and aperture) so that the histogram of the photograph arrives as far to the right as possible, avoiding high light clipping (see above). Obviously it will be necessary to do some tests, checking the histogram of the pictures.

In high contrast conditions the histogram will be so full that it seems not possible to apply this technique, in this case the important thing is to use always high lights. as a reference, stopping just before burning out them. A difficult and highly contrasted photo will therefore probably be underexposed compared to what is indicated by the exposure meter, becasue we want to keep the begin of the histogram as far to the right as possible.

I would like to repeat this passage: expose to the right normally generates brighter images than normal, but in case of strong lights, we will have to be careful to don't burn the high lights, so basically we're going to lower the exposure. Obviously you have to use your brain, we're not saying to properly expose the few pixels that represent the sun, but of the scene as a whole, with the necessary exceptions: for example, a light bulb on or the sun should not be considered as part of the histogram.

What do the detractors say? And what about us?

After analyzing the technique let's try to understand why there are also many theories that consider it superfluous, if not even counterproductive.

According to this interesting article of ChromaSoft the advantages of expose to the right do not exist, the gain in quality is so negligible that it is not even considerable.

In case of strong contrasts, such as a sunny sky with some clouds and a subject in shadow, exposing to the right without burning the highlights would leave the shadows too dark, even pitch black. In these cases it would be much better to burn the cloud a little trying to expose the subject correctly. This problem is more noticeable on cheap or outdated cameras, with a lower dynamic range than the latest generation DSLRs.

We must remember that this technique has been created several years in the past, in the meantime many steps forward have been made in the world of sensors.

The way I see it, becoming obsessive in expose on the right could have made sense a few years ago, when the quality of the sensors was lower. With the evolution of cameras, the increase in dynamic range in sensors, HDR photography and increasingly precise exposure meters, the use of ETTR (expose to the right) will be forgotten. We must also remember that there are some situations in which we do not have time to think about the best settings. I would also like to say that my personal experience tells me that recovering shadows offers poorer quality results, but it is practically always possible. Trying to recover a burned light is simply impossible. So I agree that it would be preferable to have a slightly underexposed picture rather than burned, in case the contrast of the photo is very high. This is to say that when I find myself taking pictures with the sun high in the sky and something white in the frame, I usually lower the exposure meter by half a stop.

Expose to the right is therefore an interesting and almost always right technique. Surely it's not fundamental to follow it, but there's nothing wrong with using it in shots where contrast and dark shadows are not a problem. It also forces us to stop and think about the best way to set our camera, using manual settings, reading the histogram and being able to set the correct exposure, which is good and right, especially if you shoot in jpg format. Thanks to the RAW format, which allows to recover up to 2 stops, and all the advances and automatism of modern cameras, writing and reading this article is more for educational than for a practical purpose. Obviously if you shoot with an old camera it's definitely worth the effort to expose to the right when possible.

If you liked this tutorial here you can find all the other tutorials we wrote about photographyand post production with Gimp. If you liked our work, you could consider to ❤support us by clicking here you can see how.

Gimp tutorial: add text

How to use Gimp to add text in a picture: in this tutorial we'll see how to use Gimp's text tool to create a meme. We will also see the Gimp text tool options and usage.

Among the many Gimp tools, the Gimp text tool allows us to add a text over an image. Inserting text over a photograph can often be very useful or fun, for example to write a comment on a photo, create a business card, insert your watermark over an image, create a meme or a website...

In short, the possibilities with Gimp text tool are countless. In this tutorial we will create a simple (and a little crappy) Meme, adding a text over a picture, and we will see all the different Gimp text tool options.

How to add text with Gimp

Let's start by opening with Gimp the image where we want to add the text. In this case it is a car, completely submerged by snow. For greater readability, we have created a black border, which you can make in many different ways. In this case the framing of the photo was wide, so it was possible to simply color a part of the photography in black. To do this we used the Rectangle select tool to select a part of the photo, then we inverted the selection from the menu Select → Invert, we deleted the content pressing CANC on the keyboard and finally we colored the outside of the image with the Bucket Fill Tool and a black color. If you don't know how to proceed to create a rectangular selection, you can read our tutorial on Gimp selection tools here.

Before proceeding, we need to deepen the knowledge of the Gimp Text Tool. The description says "Create or edit text layers" this is because Gimp consider texts as new layers, this allow us to edit them, move them around the canvas, duplicate them and so on. Anyway the text tools simply allows us to add a text in Gimp.

First thing to do is to select the Text Tool from the Toolbar, the icon is a capital A and you can see it next.

In order to add a text in Gimp we need to draw an area for the text itself, so with the Text Tool selected, you have to draw a rectangle over your image, in the place where you want the text to be added, clicking and holding the Left mouse button. After the creation of a Text Layer of a determinate dimension, you can write a text. Remember that we can change the text area dimension and position in any moment, so don't be too precise. You can also simply click anywhere in the canvas with the Left mouse button and start typing, without draw any text area, in that case Gimp will add the text where you'll click, and will make the size of the Text area automatically fit to the text you'll write.

Text tool options

Font: here you can change the aspect of the added text. You can press the Aa button to open a list of all the fonts available, or you can also write the name that you need in the text box, after you type the first letter, the corresponding fonts will start to appear. You can choose any font that is installed in the Windows folder. If you install a new font with Gimp opened, you need to restart Gimp before being able to use it.

Size: here you can change the dimension of the added text. You can write any number. You can also improve or reduce the value, clicking one the two tiny arrows on the right of the box. Gimp default size unit is Pixels (px), if you prefer to use a different measure for your text, you can change the font size unit in the dropdown menu on the right. There are many different options, but the most of the times pixels is the best one.

Use editor: this option is unselected by default. If you leave the box unticked, you will add the text directly inside the text layer, and you can change the settings in this menu as usual. If you tick the checkbox, a new Gimp floating window will appear. In the floating window will be possible to write the text in an esasier way if the canvas is really crowded. You can also change some options. If you are used to an old version of Gimp you could prefer to activate this option because it will be the same as it was used to be in the past.

Antialiasing: this option is enabled by default. When is enabled, it makes the borders of the added text appear smoother and better looking. Every curve and angle appears softer, not jagged and seems to have more resolution. This option should always be checked, but if for any reason you need a really sharp and pixelated border, you can disable it.

Hinting: in this drop-down menu you can change the hinting value. Hinting alters the font outline to produce a crisp bitmap at small sizes, to make it simple, it means that change this setting could give better results with tiny texts, that could appear easily readable. If you need to add a tiny text, I suggest you to try all the different Gimp hinting options, to see which one do you prefer.

Color: here you can change the color of the added text. Remember that you always need to change the color from this menu, because if you simply change the foreground color of Gimp, it doesn't affect the color of the added Text. After you click, the usual color window will appear, where you can change the color in many different ways: typing a value, using sliders or choosing the tone you like from the color palette.

Justify: this option works exactly in the same way of any word processor. You have four icons, and you can choose how the added text has to align respect to the text area. First option is Left justified, so Gimp will align the text on the left. Second option is Right justified and it's simply an alignment on the right side. The third and default button is Centered, that align every line of the text in the center. The fourth and last button is Filled. In this case Gimp will improve the space between the single words, in order to keep the text aligned both on left and right side of the Text area.

Indentation, line and letter spacing: This three options are used to define the spacing of the text. First line is the Indentation of the first line, it is the used to separate a paragraph from the left or right margins. If you write a positive or negative value, the first line of the text will be differently aligned compared to the other lines. It works only with left and right alignment and after you press the enter key. Second option is Line spacing, you can choose how much space Gimp has to leave between one line of text and the next. The third option is Letter spacing, that is simply the distance between each letter. In both cases you can use positive and negative values.

Box: this parameter affects the Gimp text area. If you simply click in the canvas with the mouse, and then you write something, the text box will be Dynamic because, without a defined size, the shape and dimension of the text box will be dynamic, and will automatically fit to the text you add. If you need to contain the text within a specific area, you can draw a rectangle with the text tool. In this case the Box will automatically become Fixed, because the added text will fit inside the fixed text box you have drawn.

You could have noticed that we miss two really important buttons, they are Bold and Italic. The reason is simple, when you choose the font from the Gimp drop-down menu, you will find different versions of the same font. For example Verdana exist in other three different versions: Verdana Bold, Verdana Italic and Verdana Bold Italic, so you simply have to choose the font you want from the dropdown menu instead of choosing later if you want it bold or italic. Here you'll notice a tiny limitation of Gimp text tool: the added text can have only one style. If you need to make a single word bold, it will not be possible. In this case I simply add spaces, then I create a second text layer with the bold word, and I place it in the right position.

Add the text to create the meme

Now that you know all the different options of the Gimp Text tool is time to add the text to create the meme. We want the text to be aligned with the photo, so we need to create a fixed text area. First of all select the Text tool in the toolbar, then drag a rectangle the same size of the photo, a little bit lower, as in the next image. Then change the color of the text to white, the font and the other parameters as you like, and finally write the text to add.

If you want you can watch this YouTube video where we show how to proceed. There are some tiny differences, because it has been made with the old version of Gimp, but the concepts are the same.

If you liked this tutorial about Text Tool of Gimp, here you can find all the other guides we wrote about photo editing with Gimp, or you can go there to take a look to our photography tutorials. If you liked our work, you could consider to ❤support us by clicking here you can see how.