My sucky sigs. :P [Warning, lotsa images. o.o]

Ello. I'm Gamefreak318. I just recently obtained GIMP, and have been working with it as much as possible to figure out its odds and ends. I'm slowly, if at all, improving, and here are some of my sigs so far. I am very open to constructive criticism and suggestions, not flaming for how bad they are.

NEW!




















Fin.

Okay, lets help you improve

First of all, when cutting out images, boost the tolerance of the magic wand, you don't really want that white outline around the renders unless you are using a white backgruond - in which case you usually cant see it.

Secondly, use renders/backgrounds that match, or blend them together. This can take a while to master, but practice is always good .

Thirdly, try to make your text stand out less, use a variety of fonts. The font you have used on most of these sigs is okay, but they get a bit same-y after looking at all of them together.

Finally, use a variety of renders, try not to use the same one twice unless you are simply improving your peice.



Of course, I critisize thinking someone has Photoshop. Which, you dont, so you may not be able to do all I have suggested, due to less features.

Thanks a lot for the help, guys!

I'll try to make a new one with the suggestions you gave me.

I'm really not going to pick on you about the renders. People take so much time giving advice on how to work with them that it seems almost ridiculous. The major problem with your sigs, in my opinion, is the background. The backgrounds are extremely generic and rather than looking good with the render..they end up making the whole sig look way too amateur. I know that you're just learning, but here's some advice that I have for you:

- Don't feel like you have to download a million brush sets to make a nice sig. I interpret obbsessive use of brushes as someone using a tool made by a stranger to prevent his/herself from having to put work into something. I'm not sure if I wrote that sentence entirely clearly, so let me give you an example: Some guy makes a great fractal brush and rather than downloading a programme to make fractals, you download the set of...50 brushes. You use most of them to make the background to your sig. This is like hiring cheap labour-- it may get the job done, but you don't really have the pride of doing the actual job.

- Experiment with text. If you see some cool text on someone's signature, try it yourself! Don't feel like you have to make mundane default-ish text on your sigs. Use text effects or don't use them, but use discretion when picking a font. I hate when people don't think that text has much to do with a good sig.

- Use your best judgement. I'm not asking you to be skilled in colour theory, but when you see colours that just don't look right together..change them! This is basically the key to making a sig. If you can't recognise flaws in your own work beforehand, it makes you too reliant on other people to point them out.

That's all. Hope this will help you with learning to make better sigs. For now, these are mediocre. And mediocre in a not-very-good way. I really do think that you will get better though.

Meh. A writing group I'm in.

And thanks for the helpful advice Mushroom Queen.

EDIT: Added new pic...I tried to use the suggestions you all gave me...Only problem is with the text, I can't quite figure out how to get text I have into GIMP. And also, I don't have a full understanding of GIMP yet, so it's a bit hard to find my way around it. But I'm doin my best.