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GIMP Roundup: Circular Image at Lightning Speed

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    nikUnique
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An image with a blue background, on which we can see a circular form with an image inside it. On the circular image, we can see a lake, bushes, mountains, and the sky with a couple of clouds.

Intro

Let's imagine: you're deep in application development, and suddenly you need to transform a square image into a circle. But wait - no AI is around to help. What to do? No problem, I got you covered. In this blog post, I'll show you how to transform a square image into a circle really fast.

It may be difficult to look at images in this article at 100% zoom level, so I recommend increasing it for a better visual experience.

How to Transform a Square Image into a Circular One in GIMP

Here are the exact steps on how to transform a square image into a circular one:

Preparation

  1. Open a square image in GIMP (You can also copy the image from somewhere else and paste it directly into GIMP)
  • Ensure the image is a perfect square
A square image in the GIMP editor, which is visually divided diagonally in half, where the left half is of a blueish color, while the right is of a reddish color.

Alpha Channel Preparation

  1. Go to the Layers dialog, right-click on the image layer, and choose Add Alpha Channel
Dropdown menu in GIMP Layers dialog, with 'Add Alpha Channel' option highlighted to enable transparent background editing.
  • Why? Enables transparent background

Non-precise Circular Selection

  1. Select Ellipse Select tool
GIMP toolbar with Ellipse Select tool selected, used for creating circular or elliptical image selections.
  1. Click and drag to create an initial selection (Don't worry about the shape, any shape is fine now)
Rough elliptical selection created by clicking and dragging over a square image, showing initial step of circular cropping process.

Precise Selection Configuration

  1. In the Tool Options Window:
  • Position X: 1 (left margin)
  • Position Y: 1 (top margin)
  • Width: Set to full image width (e.g., 1024)
  • Height: Set to full image height (e.g., 1024)
GIMP Ellipse Select tool options, configuring selection to match exact image dimensions.

Background Removal

  1. Left-click on the image and go to the Select menu > choose Invert
GIMP menu showing 'Select' > 'Invert' option to prepare for background removal.
  • Selects outside of circular area
  1. Press Delete or select Edit menu > choose Clear
GIMP interface after deleting non-circular image areas, revealing transparent background.
  • Removes non-circular regions
  • Preserves circular shape

Export

  1. Select File menu > choose Export As

  2. Save as PNG to preserve transparency.

Conclusion

That's it! This is how you can transform a square image into a circular one super quickly without manual fiddling. If you like this article, please share it with someone who might find it interesting too. Like my blog? Subscribe to the newsletter.

Got questions? Send an email to commitnobug@outlook.com.