G'MIC 4.0: Squaring the Pixel, Easier Than Ever!

G'MIC - GREYC's Magic for Image Computing: A Full-Featured Open-Source Framework for Image Processing

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Latest stable version: 4.0.3 (2026/07/20)

News

G'MIC 4.0: Squaring the Pixel, Easier Than Ever!

Eighteen years after its debut, G’MIC, our free and open-source framework for digital image processing, reaches a major milestone with the release of a new major version, numbered 4.0 — the version of maturity!

As we do every year, this is the opportunity to look back at the recent developments of the project since our last update published in August 2025.

Note: Click on the images to view them in full resolution, or to watch a corresponding video when they feature the icon<br>1. G’MIC: An Open-Source Framework for Digital Image Processing

The G'MIC project (GREYC's Magic for Image Computing) was born in July 2008 and grew within the IMAGE team of the GREYC laboratory in Caen, France (a Joint Research Unit under the joint authority of CNRS, ENSICAEN, and the University of Caen).

Its purpose: to provide a free, open, and extensible framework for the manipulation, processing, and creation of digital images. To achieve this, it relies on the features of the CImg open-source C++ image processing library, developed since 1999—first at INRIA, and later within the IMAGE team of the GREYC (also by yours truly).

At the heart of the project lies a dedicated scripting language interpreter, the "G'MIC language", specifically designed for rapid prototyping of new image processing algorithms and chaining them into custom pipelines (or filters). Built around this core are several interfaces that grant users access to hundreds of predefined image processing operators. These include the gmic command-line tool, the G'MIC Online web service, and the G'MIC-Qt plugin, which can be integrated into various image editing and creation software such as GIMP, Krita, digiKam, Paint.net, Adobe Photoshop, or Affinity Photo. Today, this plugin is the project's most popular interface, averaging over 1,200 daily downloads, a figure that has been steadily growing over the past year. It offers over 640 varied filters to tweak your images and expand the capabilities of host editing software, making it particularly appreciated by digital artists.

This major 4.0 release marks a turning point for the project: the syntax of the G'MIC language, the interpreter code, and the associated image-processing algorithms are now mature and well-proven. Therefore, we intend to slow down the pace of new releases and feature additions a bit, in order to focus on the stability, robustness, and performance of the framework.

Fig. 1.1. Overview of some of the interfaces offered by the G'MIC project: G'MIC-Qt plugin for GIMP (top left), CLI tool gmic (top right), G'MIC Online web service (bottom).

2. New Filters in the G'MIC-Qt Plugin

Regarding the G'MIC-Qt plugin, most of the new features focus on the introduction of new image processing filters. Version 4.0 brings the total number of filters to 644, all directly accessible from the graphical interface. Below is a list of the latest additions.

2.1. "Rendering / Pixel Stretch" Filter

The "Rendering / Pixel Stretch" filter allows the user to select a "strip of pixels" and duplicate it across the image along a customizable path, defined by two spline curves (one for each edge of the strip).

Fig. 2.1.1. The "Rendering / Pixel Stretch" filter as it appears in the G'MIC-Qt plugin.

Fig. 2.1.2. Render example from the "Rendering / Pixel Stretch" filter, featuring two pixel trails added by the filter.

This effect gives the impression that the image has been stretched locally, much like an elastic dough. It can be used to suggest or stylize movement in an image, as shown in the example below (taken from the video tutorial that Miguel Pineau specifically dedicated to this filter). It is also highly suitable for glitch art or creating abstract textures.

Fig. 2.1.3. The "Rendering / Pixel Stretch" filter used to stylize a dancer's movement (Credits: Miguel Pineau).

2.2. "Rendering / Gradients [Poles]" Filter

Also in the "Rendering" section, we have the new "Rendering / Gradients [Poles]" filter. It generates color gradients by spatially interpolating colored key points, whose positions and colors are chosen by the user. The interpolation uses radial basis functions, resulting in smooth and harmonious color transitions. Users can also select the color space in which the interpolation is computed. The animation below...