The latest version of the GIMP freeware image editor is the result of six years of work and offers a new image processing engine, better tools and revamped colour management support.

GIMP provides the tools needed for high quality image manipulation, from retouching to restoring to creative composites. It also gives artists the power and flexibility to transform images into new creations. Version 2.10.22 of GIMP is significant because it ships with far more new features, including new and improved tools, better file formats support, various usability improvements and features targeted at digital painters and photographers, metadata editing. The user interface has been updated with a choice of four interface themes: Dark (default), Gray, Light, and System. Icons have been separated from themes to enable users to configure GIMP to match the theme of choice with coloured or monochrome icons. This allows them to choose the System theme with colour icons if they prefer the old look. The icons are now available in four sizes now to improve their appearance on HiDPI displays and GIMP will do its best to detect which size to use. Manual override is available by selecting Edit > Preferences > Interface > Icon Themes.

The ultimate goal for v2.10 was completing the port to GEGL image processing library, which is now used for all tile management. Benefits include high bit depth support (up to 32-bit per colour channel), multi-threading in both GEGL processing and core GIMP and the option to select GPU-side processing for systems with stable OpenCL drivers. GEGL processing also enables users to work on images in a linear RGB colour space as opposed to gamma-corrected (perceptual) RGB colour space and freely switch between them. In addition, when higher than 8-bit per channel precision is used, all channels data is linear.

Colour management is now a core feature of GIMP rather than a plug-in. GIMP now uses LittleCMS v2, which allows it to use ICC v4 colour profiles. The latest version also includes a number of features that make use of CIE LAB and CIE LCH colour spaces.

Click here to download GIMP and see all the new features introduced with the latest version.