GIMP

may be you saw gimp before or may be better than that you may be worked on it and may be you working on it now , but unfortunately may be you never heard about it , in all cases this article will be useful for you
ok lets start

— GIMP is not totally different from PhotoShop :-

if you are a photoshop designer dont worry about your previous exerience of photoshop gimp also has similar functions as photoshop you will not feel strange when you open gimp
take alook



as you can see there is main three windows in gimp
toolbox:

there is  some tools is similat to photoshop like select tools & also lisso and magic tools …. etc
the gimp tool box is so simple except some advanced tools may be i will go to discuss further in next chapters ( don’t worry )
main work area:
its your work area


and finall layers , options and navigation panels
as you can see in layers panel  there is opacity and mode level for every layer
and below the layer panel there is navigation panel you can zoom in and zoom out the work and select any area in your design so you can control your large size design in a click

— PhotoShop plugins, brushes and filters in gimp ?!!!!  :-

yes its totally true , you can move your plugins and filters to your gimp very simple so you can use your familiar plugins , brushes and filters
using the awesome gimp plugin PSPI
first down load the plugin from here PSPI
move the entire content of PSPI plugin to plugin folder in your gimp
then restart gimp and in the bottom you will see
Photopshop Filters Plug-In Settings
select it and you will see a dialog just type your photoshop plugin location
enjoy