I Started Working With Layers -- Do You Guys Like? Tips?

[rzr]

So, I started working with layers now. I'm really getting into it and they seem to be the best tool I've used so far in terms of quality. Here's a few samples with explanations of how I worked on it. Before the samples, if anyone can find me a GIMP Tutorial I'd love it. I have GIMP 2.4.7 and I think the only tutorial I found is for a higher version, so I'm still just teaching myself everything. Anyway, without further adieu, the samples:



This one, as you can see, is my avatar. I hate it, but I was sick of my old one and didn't have anything else. I put a fractal as the last layer, first. Then laid a border on. Then a black gradient. I made the border and gradient almost transparent so you can see the fractal and then moved the gradient layer down and right so a bit of the fractal shined while still fading into the center. Then I added some gay pattern to the font.



I was playing around with some extensions and found this cool one that looked like burnt paper. It had a white background, so I changed the BG to transparent. Then, I added a lightning layer. Then I filled all the parts I think look like a maze in with this cobalt pattern and changed around the opaqueness of the layers to get what I wanted.



So, pretty basic. I made a red sphere with a drop shadow. Added the whirly blue pattern to the drop shadow layer and dimmed it. Added a lightening pattern to the background and dimmed it. I thought the ball looked cool so I stopped. Then started back up and made this:




Same thing except the layers are more opaque with a fractal cropped into the ball.



I made a logo. Darkened the drop shadow and used the clipboard brush, which is a mirror image of the text, to stamp it once behind the original text. I highlighted the original text and used this cool brush with a firey gradient on the letters. Then, I added the Cool Blue pattern in the back and threw in a semi-transparent fractal.



No idea how I made the background but then I took a rainbow gradient and set it to swirl and made the swirls small and kept doing it until I got when I wanted. Then I made it less opaque and centered it.



SOTA logo, 33.67% opaque lightening background, fractal background2.



This one took a lot of work. I had a fractal and I filtered out a bunch of **** by filling it in with black then a cool pattern. Took the fractal and duplicated it 3 times facing all 4 in a different direction. Changed the opaqueness so all would be visible. Played with a brush in the background. Then I made a new layer on top as white. Took a wide rainbow gradient over it and dimmed it. Moved the rainbow layer down 4 so the fractal was still visible.