Text functionality in GIMP

Internationalization

• full support of all Unicode content
• support for all OpenType features
• multiple writing systems in the same text-box
• right to left and top-down typing

Corrections

• the text content is always accessible and editable
• all applied effects are kept
• binding of graphical output to the original wording is broken
• the user decides on the order things are done (graphics first? -> placeholder text)

Quick plain text

• the full-functionality text-tool is not obligatory
• simple annotations are supported
• can be inserted in an easy way

Effects

• stroke text
• fill text
• all effects and filter can be applied on the text itself (see "Corrections")

Layout

• full control to the user on every level
• all this is done in the context of the overall work:
  • the canvas
  • the applied effects

Positioning

• freely positionable on the canvas
• text boxes of any shape
• (rectangular) box fixed or dynamic
• text along path
• transformation tools
• combinations of above functions
• ?layout grid on text layer?

Typography

• fine grained-control
• presets can be saved
• manual access (M) to open type (OT) features: Glyph palette

Character level

• Font family
• Font style
• size
• Color
• Hinting
• Kerning (M+OT)
• faux bold
• faux italics
• underline
• through-line
• baseline shift
• language

+ OpenType features

• ?glyph scaling

line level

• leading (Line Spacing)
• tracking

paragraph level

• Indent
• justifying
• inter-paragraph spacing
• text-flow