Adobe Photoshop CS4 and GIMP Help

Question

I think I am fairly computer literate and I enjoy trying things out before having to consult with the owners manual but two programs that absolutely stump me are Adobe and Gimp. I hope I am in the right area because I need help understanding how to use either of those programs on my macbook. I would like to make simple website banners and myspace type comment boxes and i've had such a hard time comprehending those programs. I've done many google searches for tutorials and majority of them teach on a level of intermediate users. I've never used either program.
Or if anyone knows of a simple banner making program, please enlighten me.

Answer 1

demetracaston wrote:
I would like to make simple website banners and myspace type comment boxes and i've had such a hard time comprehending those programs. I've done many google searches for tutorials and majority of them teach on a level of intermediate users. I've never used either program.
It is true that the use of a specific program not made by Apple is well outside the scope of this particular forum, although it isn't wrong to ask around. (For example, if someone has an Apple Aperture question, you don't ask it here, you ask it in the Aperture forum, even though Aperture runs on OS X.)
It sounds like you might actually want to pick up a book about the basics of digital painting programs in general. When making graphics as simple as web banners, the functions provided by Photoshop and GIMP are so standard that other programs imitate them. Meaning if you don't have those down yet, you'll have trouble with any program you try. If you have problems understanding these core functions at an intermediate level, you probably should take some tutorials at a basic level, like the QuickStart guides or Classroom in a Book type of guides (I'm thinking of the printed books of this type), hopefully some concentrating on web graphics.
If we were to lay out what to do in Photoshop or GIMP to make a web banner, it would be: Make a new document the size of the allotted space on the web page, in pixels. Use the type tool and graphics tools to create the banner graphics. Save a copy of the document in the web file format required for insertion into the web page.
If you need more details than that, you do need more grounding than should be provided in a forum that's intended to discuss an operating system.