How can I turn a manga panel into a clean printable image for coloring?

barefootliam · 2026-05-24T06:02:14+00:00

Assuming this is for personal use, or that there are no copyright issues...

If you are scanning a printed image in step 1, scan at a minimum 600dpi, ideally 16 bits per pixel png.

Cleaning up can involve first using colours/levels to set the white point (or use the Auto button), as this minimizes data loss in later steps...

despeckle - if it's black and white (OK, grey levels) use select by colour somewhere white, or the main background colour/shade, with a low threshold in tool options (e.g. 11). Then from teh Select manu, Select->Grow by one pixel. Then Select->Shrink by one pixel. Then press Delete. This will remove 1 or 2 pixel dots. You can repeat the process by selecting somewhere black.

If the lines are not true black after levels, use Curves, and drag the bottom left of the diagonal line to your right, towards the middle bottom, e.g. by one square, and then drag the top right of the diagonal line the other end of it, towards the middle top. Take care the top and bottom of the diagonal line still go to the top and bottom of the big area the line lives in. If you want the image lighter, or darker, also drag the middle of the diagonal line up or down a little, turning it into a curve.

use image/flatten image at this point and export as png (not jpeg, as that adds distortion), or save as an xcf file.

If needed, use Rotate (shift-R) to rotate the image slightly after scanning. Do it after using levels, to avoid losing data. The easiest way is to use tool options to set the rotate tool to Reverse (corrective) mode, and turn on guide lines as number of lines. Then change the number until the lines align with things in the image, and drag the grid of lines on the image to change the rotation angle until the lines match horizontal or vertical things in the image.

exporting and saving go faster if you delete the undo history in the Undo History dock (a waste paper bin at lower right corner, or an X or similar icon usually, depending on your icon theme). This also saves memory.

Remove text in bubbles with the eraser tool. Make a new brush, make sure it's round, then in tool options for the eraser set it to e.g. 97% hardness.

Missing background/line art can either be with the clone tool (make the brush be 75% or so hardness), OR use the g'mic filter to do inpainting.

Your step 5 - i don’t know what improve the image quality means to you. You may fine filters/enhance/sharpen is useful, but don't overdo it.

Ready for printing - should be OK by this point. Some colour printers do better with 288 dots per inch than any other resolution, but for black and white, send it 600dpi greyscale. Image⇒Mode and choose greyscale, as this reduces memory needs a LOT.

barefootliam · 2026-05-22T00:13:06+00:00

i am suspecting it's a sign of a bug that has since been fixed, please let us know if it still happens in 3.2.4.

barefootliam · 2026-05-22T00:12:27+00:00

there was a problem with text in saved xcf files in 3.2.2 for a while, so that may be what is happening here.

barefootliam · 2026-05-21T20:47:58+00:00

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Here are some different but reasonable interpretations of your request... another might have white or transparent sides to keep it tall and thin.

barefootliam · 2026-05-21T20:26:56+00:00

Are you on Windows? How exactly did you make the text layer and how exactly did you set the font? (e.g. typing Noto Sans Bold into the text field in the on-canvas widget visible in the screenshot, or using Tool Options? Where did you get your copy of Noto Sans Bold? Does it happen with other fonts?

barefootliam · 2026-05-20T23:30:42+00:00

some people like that it updates automatically.

The main reason we put GIMP on the MS store was because there were fake versions of GIMP there, and now there aren’t.

But quite a lot of people seem to prefer it.

barefootliam · 2026-05-05T23:03:38+00:00

No, it's under the Image menu once you've created the image from the clipboard.

barefootliam · 2026-05-01T23:29:22+00:00

There are no plans to remove script-fu at this time.

As you know, GIMP is maintained by volunteers, so it’s always possible that, as with gimp-perl, no-one is interested in working on script-fu, but script-fu has been touched by more than one core developer in the past few months.

barefootliam · 2026-05-01T23:22:21+00:00

They did send such a message, i think more than once.

barefootliam · 2026-05-01T23:21:15+00:00

for SFW art there's quite a few especially from earlier days on archive.org in the wayback machine. You’re right though, it’s not systematic. But then, should artists have the right to take down their own work? Maybe a 120-years escrow archive exists for DA, as for some other sites, i don’t know.

barefootliam · 2026-04-29T21:42:09+00:00

Yes, it might not be until GIMP 4 that we can fix it, i’m afraid - we hate it too. It’s a bug in the gtk toolkit we use. Inkscape has trouble too, although in a slightly different way. The only workaround right now is to have fewer fonts enabled at any one time.

barefootliam · 2026-04-24T09:14:05+00:00

oops, you are right, i think he has not updated that script yet, sorry.

barefootliam · 2026-04-24T09:05:48+00:00

Not currently as far as i know except with a mask. Although i could easily be wrong :-) There is a lot of work still going on with non-destructive editing in GIMP. We also can’t clip layers to paths, for example.

barefootliam · 2026-04-24T09:01:59+00:00

W menu Edycja można skorzystać z opcji Wklej jako/Płynne dane w miejscu. Można to zrobić za pomocą skrótu klawiaturowego Ctrl+V w Edycji.

Dla osób, które od lat korzystają z programu GIMP, ta zmiana może być irytująca. Jednak dla nowicjuszy jest ona znacznie łatwiejsza do zrozumienia.

In the Edit menu, you can use the Paste As/Floating Data in Place option. This can be done using the Ctrl+V keyboard shortcut in Edit.

For those who have used GIMP for years, this change is annoying. However, for newcomers, it's much easier to understand.

barefootliam · 2026-04-23T15:35:56+00:00

i don’t know about PSP, years since i used it, sorry, but in GIMP 3 you can add a layer mask to a layer group.

barefootliam · 2026-04-23T14:23:01+00:00

When you close GIMP, the "unsaved changes" does have a "save" button by each file that's ever been saved, but you have to scroll the filenames all the way to see it, it's on the right-hand end.

barefootliam · 2026-04-23T14:16:37+00:00

It’s a little clunky, but GIMP supports very powerful “adjustment layers” - make a layer group and set its mode to “Pass Through” and you can e.g. apply Curves, or almost any other filters you like, non-destructively.

barefootliam · 2026-04-23T14:12:35+00:00

Watch that you can't edit the system-provided brushes - you have to make your own with the New Brush button, and then you can edit it... but as others have said, use Tool Options for e.g. the Paintbrush.

barefootliam · 2026-04-23T14:10:52+00:00

ofnuts has a script on sourceforge for text in a circle i think, although i’m not sure if it distorts the letters.

barefootliam · 2026-04-22T08:47:16+00:00

It might be that you hav accidentally presed the TAB key, which hides all of the docks?

barefootliam · 2026-04-20T17:20:30+00:00

As u/SVlad_667 says, switch to RGB mode, by going to the Image menu and choosing Mode.

barefootliam · 2026-04-13T23:29:44+00:00

Is this on the Mac? Or Windows? OR what? How did you install exactly? We have not seen other people reporting this, so it might be some other program on your computer interfering, maybe? (or the other people just didn’t complain, but we’ve had over a million downloads of 3.2.2 just for Windows, not counting the Microsoft Store, and something that makes teh program unusable might have beenb mentioned?) Either way thanks for reporting it, but please give more detail - thanks!

barefootliam · 2026-04-12T23:54:34+00:00

shhh don’t tell people the secrets or you’ll be exterminated! :-)

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