(Please note "Because nobody likes the blur" is an example of the bluriness, not of this techique. I'm pretty sure you knew that already.)
You have been warned (or will be in the message bellow):
This technique is ridiculously simple, quite possibly to an insulting degree. It isn't exactly what one might consider to be "asthetically appealing" either. The fact of the matter is that this tutorial will teach you how to use a single text function. That's right
one function. However, it is a function that (while blatently obvious) I have only recently discovered. Why post a tutorial then? I have never heard of this function mentioned once in my entire stay at the gimp dome (including when it was the gimp battle dome). If you already knew of this, then I apologize for wasting your time. If you didn't, then I hope that this will help you in the future, as it has for me.
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Why does text blur when you rotate/skew it?
Fonts are natively vector. However, aside from simply changing font size, as soon as text is scaled or rotated in the gimp, it is treated like any raster image (It becomes pixelated). The bluring is simply a method of smoothing to make the pixelation less noticable.
However, there
are vector aspects in the GIMP - paths. I am sure you are well aquainted with these, and if you are not, I suggest you read Fencepost's awsome tutorial. As you may know, it is entirely possible to convert selections into paths. This is a very useful function, but the algorithm that vectorizes the selection is not entirely accurate. That is where the text to path function comes into play. You can find it simply by double clicking on the text tool, and yet I had never really noticed it.
And now we use it:
1)Create a new document
2)Click on the text tool
3)Type your desired message (let's keep it simple for now. "woot" should do it.)
4)Double click on the text tool
5)click on the "Create path from Text" function
6)Open the layers dialog (ctrl + L) and create a new layer
7)Open the paths dialouge (Dialogs>paths) and make the path visible
8)Double click on your desired transform tool
9)set it so that it modifies paths
10)Begin messing with the text.
11)Repeat 8-10 untill The text is where you want it to be
13)Click (select>from path)
14)Fill in the selection with the color of your choice
15)make the path invisible
That was awsome.
Whether you thought that this tutorial was useful or just painful to look at, feedback is appreciated.
