GIMP 2.99.12 is released with new features, updated Photoshop compatibility.
The free and open source drawing program brings the latest point release (development) in the 2.99 series with a list of new features and updates. GIMP’s point releases are not minor ones. They often bring several new features and improvements.
Although, in the official release announcement, the team did not say specifically when the much-anticipated GIMP 3.0.0 will be released. As it is a community project and a complex one, we can guess it will be released when ready.
GIMP 2.99.12 is a huge milestone towards GIMP 3.0. Many of the missing pieces are getting together, even though it is still a work in progress.
GIMP Devs
With that said, let’s quickly recap on the new features of GIMP 2.99.12.
GIMP 2.99.12 Dev Release
The feature list is spread across core features, colour modules, themes, updated compatibility in file formats, platform support. Since the feature list is a little large, I will touch upon the important ones.
Firstly, with GIMP 2.99.12 you can resize the brush strokes while being on the canvas. You do not need to change the brush settings from the Tool options dock. To enable this feature you need to press ALT+right click to enable the resize function.
Team also informed that more “on-canvas” features are bring worked on for the future updates such as opacity changes and so on.
Secondly, a new “by distance” Zoom feature is introduced in Preferences > Canvas Interactions. The more distance you drag, the more Zoom you get.
Other noteworthy core features include, improved tool pointers, revamp of “fill by line art detection” bucket tool and updated pinching gestures.
The CYMK colour model finally gets more features thanks to Google Summer of Projects 2022, which we covered a while back containing many interesting feature additions in open-source projects.
In this release, the CYMK simulation data is now part of image data and stored within GIMP’s own file format *.xcf. In addition other CMYK colour profile features include new plugins, CYMK data in exported file formats and so on.
Furthermore, other necessary improvements is seen actoss Photoshop file (psd) compatibility and handling, batch processing, Wayland and macOS support.
For more information, visit the detailed change log of GIMP 2.99.12.
Download
Remember that this is a development release and not a stable one. The stable GIMP version is the current 2.10.xx series which is available in all major distributions at the moment.
The development version i.e. 2.99.12 is available as Flatpak form this page. You can set up your system for Flatpak and install it using the following commands in Linux distributions.
For Windows and macOS, visit this page to download this version.
flatpak install --user https://flathub.org/beta-repo/appstream/org.gimp.GIMP.flatpakref flatpak run org.gimp.GIMP//beta
Via announcement.
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