Some of the tools are used for selecting (e.g. Lasso, Transform), some are used for drawing (Rectangle, Ellipse) and some are for special purposes (Hot spot, Crop).
All tools have a one-letter shortcut - you can select the Eyedropper tool by pressing Y.
Documents consist of pages, pages consist of layers.
When editing an icon, the pages with different size and color depth show different aspects of the icon, allowing the operating system to choose the format which will suit the current needs best.
When editing an animation, the pages logically correspond to movie frames.
Layers are similar to real-life transparent plastic sheets stacked on top of each other. Thus you are able to edit the background and foreground separately, correcting mistakes without altering the other layers. Click here to learn more about them.
This displays tooltips and useful messages while drawing (cursor position, shape size).
When GFIE starts, this screen is shown to allow you to easily reach the commonly used functions.
To start a new document, open an existing one, or batch convert image files, choose one of the large command icons.
To open a recently edited file, click on the combo box below the description area and choose an item from the scroll-down list.
The check box below allows you to prevent this dialog from further appearance.
This subwindow allows you to choose the foreground and background color. Like in Paint you can have two colors on your palette: one for the left and one for the right mouse button. But, in contrary, here all colors have four components: red, green, blue and alpha (=opacity). Painting with not fully opaque colors blends the painting color with the image pixels, instead of replacing them.
There are two special colors which can be picked: transparent and inverted. Painting with the transparent color erases instead of doing nothing. Painting with the inverted color results in specially behaving image areas which invert the screen underneath (this effect is widely used at cursors).
This window contains many-many little tool buttons which allow you to configure the behavior of certain tools. For instance, you can choose between framed and filled rectangles and ellipses, and set the line width for framed objects. Hover the mouse over certain controls to get some information about what they are good for.
The Color Picker and Tool Behavior windows have a little gray triangle at the top left corner, which can be used for folding and unfolding those windows to free some workspace area. The Layers window has a sizeable border. All subwindows can be closed and reopened from the View menu. Of course, your workspace layout is preserved between GFIE sessions.