Creating an Oak texture with The Gimp

readme.md

Creating an Oak texture with The Gimp

This guide was created with The Gimp version 2.10.30. It should work largely unchanged with 2.8.x versions. You'll have to adapt it significantly for earlier versions.

1. Create a new image significantly larger (at least 20%) than what you need because this process results in an unusable margin around the outside of the image. I generally create a much larger image and then cherry pick the section that I want for my texture. My image is 3654 pixels wide and 2160 pixels high.

2. Fill the background with the lighter base color for your piece of wood. All of the manipulations that we employ to create the grain will darken this tone. I often use something like #8d6949

3. Use the HSV Noise filter (Filters -> Noise -> HSV Noise...) to add irregularity to the image. I use the following settings, but your mileage may vary.

   • Dulling – 3

   • Hue – 3.00

   • Saturation – 0.119

   • Value – 0.381

   • Blending Options / Mode – Replace

   • Blending Options / Opacity – 100.0

4. Use the Wind filter (Filters -> Distorts -> Wind...) to turn the noise into something that looks like wood grain.

   • Style – Wind

   • Direction – Left

   • Edge Affected – Both

   • Threshold – 10

   • Strength – 36

   • Blending Options / Mode – Replace

   • Blending Options / Opacity – 100.0

5. Create a new layer (Layer -> New Layer...) the same size as your image and filled with Transparency.

6. With the new layer selected as the current layer, use the Solid Noise filter (Filter -> Clouds -> Solid Noise...) to create variation. Note: The Solid Noise filter is not included with The Gimp 2.10.x. You'll need to copy it from an installation of The Gimp 2.8.x or 2.6.x to your user filters folder (%USER_PROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\GIMP\2.10\plug-ins on Windows, ~/.config/GIMP/2.10/plug-ins on Linux or MacOS).

   • Randomize – checked

   • Detail – 1

   • X size – 1.0

   • Y size – 11.5

7. Change the mode of the layer containing your solid noise clouds to Overlay and then adjust the opacity to get the effect that you want. I set the Opacity to 16.2 for my image.

8. Merge down the solid noise cloud layer (named Layer in my example) with the Background layer (Layer -> Merge Down).

9. For some of you, this may be good enough and you can skip to the final blur (step 12) to get what you want. I'm going to add one more touch for additional realism. Change the foreground color to one of the darker browns in your image or select any brown in your image and darken it; your choice. I used #260703 in my example

10. Select the Pencil tool with settings similar to the following and draw a few lines across your image.

    • Mode – Normal

    • Size – 4.00

    • Aspect Ratio – 0.00

    • Angle – 0.00

    • Spacing – 20.0

    • Dynamics – Dynamics Off

11. Use the Shift filter (Filters -> Distorts -> Shift...) to create an additional granularity common to oak.

    • Shift – 106
    • Shift direction – Horizontal
    • Clipping – Adjust
    • Blending Options / Mode – Replace
    • Blending Options / Opacity – 100.0

12. Finally, use the Gaussian Blur filter (Filters -> Blur -> Gaussian Blur...) to smooth the grain slightly.

    • Size X – 1.50
    • Size Y – 1.50
    • Filter – Auto
    • Abyss policy – Clamp
    • Clip to the input extent – checked
    • Clipping – Adjust
    • Blending Options / Mode – Replace
    • Blending Options / Opacity – 100.0

13. The final result!