The 'Can't Be Assed' Guide to Sims Screenshot Editing

 *also the Time-Strapped Simmer's Guide and the Not Familiar with Art Processors Guide

I often can't be assed - a British slang term for 'can't be bothered'. Everyone knows I love my shortcuts and lazy ways of doing things. So let me show you some quick and fairly low effort ways to edit screenshots. No CC, No Gshade, no ReShade, no ReLight, no graphics tablet, no paid art programs.

This guide is designed to be as easy to use as possible, so it will describe some things that you may find easy and not need describing. You need to remember that this community has a varying level of computer knowledge, age ranges and the like which is why I'm trying to give as clear intsructions as is possible. 

Last updated: 09/03/26

When I first started doing SimLit I noticed how dark and dull my unedited screenshots were. I tried using a program that bulk-applied filters to all my screenshots, but it looked even worse, which is why I ended up editing the screenshots one by one in the end. Takes a bit longer, but most of the time it's worth it

- This guide will use GIMP (I am using Version 3.0.4 in this guide). To download it go here, this is a collection of older downloads direct from GIMP's official site. Be careful and use an anti-virus program to scan the download first, always.

You will also need to download the GMIC plugin, which will give you access to loads of useful extra effects! 

I will try to explain everything as simply and as clearly as possible and use screenshots of the GIMP program for extra clarity. for those of you who don't use these sorts of programs often- but for anything not explained here, please use a search engine or look up the program's user help guide/documentation since this is isn't intended to be a complete GIMP tutorial.

Starting Tips for Complete Beginners

Some of these many of you probably already know about these comparative basics, but it's here for the people who are new to the game, or who otherwise aren't entirely familiar with the camera controls and options.

• I recommend saving all of your screenshots in the .png image format, but only if file size/storage space is not a concern.
  I currently use .png for everything. It allows transparency in your image, there is no loss of colour information or detail. However, the file size is also not the smallest... but there's little to no loss of quality. In my game, all of my screenshots, when taken with the C key, are automatically in .png format. This was also the case with all of my XBox screenshots when I used to play on XBox. There are external programs you can use to take in-game screenshots too, but the C key will usually do just fine.

• If file size is a concern, then .jpeg is also an option.
  As an artist, I'm not a fan of .jpeg since it can cause distortion and loss of colour detail, depending on the image. Most can't see the difference but sometimes I notice the loss and it's bothersome hence why I go for .png. It's less obvious with Sims screenshots, but still noticeable enough to bother me personally, haha. The good thing about .jpeg is that the file sizes are normally way smaller than a .png. More on this is discussed in the 'Reducing File Size' section.

• Try switching the camera from TS4-style to TS3-style
  This guide does a better job at explaining the difference between the Sims 3 and Sims 4 Camera settings. This can be done, and changed back if needed, in the Game Camera tab of the Game Options. On PC, it can be changed on the Camera Controls tab up in the top right-hand corner

• Console's 'Free Cam' Mode controls
  To access Free Cam mode on the XBox One/PS4 versions, click the camera in the top right of your screen during Live Mode. 
  
  XBox One:
  - LB and RB- change speed/pause whilst in Free Cam mode
  - A - pan screen up
  - Y - pan screen down
  - B - Exit Free Cam mode
  - Left Stick - Pans the screen forwards, backwards, and sideways
  - Right Stick - Tilts the view left, right, up and down
  - LT - Zoom out
  - RT - zoom in
  
  PS4
  - L1 and R1- change speed/pause whilst in Free Cam mode
  - Cross button - pan screen up
  - Triangle Button - pan screen down
  - Circle button - Exit Free Cam mode
  - Left Analog Stick - Pans the screen forwards, backwards, and sideways
  - Right Analog Stick - Tilts the view left, right, up and down
  - LT - Zoom out
  - RT - zoom in

• PC's Camera Mode
  Press the Tab button to put the game into Camera Mode.
  
   - Q and E - Tilt up or down
   - Speed altering: Number keys 0- Pause, 1-normal, 2- X2 speed, 3- X3 speed.
   -  A and D - Pan left/right.
   - Tab - Exit Camera Mode
   - Z + X - Zoom in/out (Can also use the mouse wheel if you have one)
   - Left Click and Drag - Freely move the camera in any direction.
   - C - Take Screenshot, which will go into the Screenshots folder of your Sims 4 folder, which will be in Documents / Electronic Arts / The Sims 4 (unless moved). Some prefer to use Print Screen or external programs like Fraps; do it whichever way works best for you!
  - CTRL + 5, 6, 7, 8, or 9 - Saves your camera angles / positions so you can re-use them later
  • 5, 6, 7, 8, or 9 - Recalls your saved angles / positions that you have saved to the relevant keys/

 

Contents

1. Colour / Gradient / Image Overlays
2. Sunny Day
3. Simple Magic Effects
4. File Size and Batch Conversion
5. Useful GIMP filters and options
6. GMIC plugin

1. Colour / Gradient / Image Overlays

Most of my screenshot editing boils down to simply putting colour overlays over the images and altering the brightness/contrast of the pictures. Colour overlays are also something I use to set a mood, as well to add cohesion to the image and aid storytelling.

 

Here is a screenshot from my XBox days of a teenage Morgyn chilling with a wolf. I want to emphasise the cold a bit and make the snow look nicer so I'm going to add a blue overlay.

 

Single Colour Overlay

 

First off, if you make an error, it's the usual button combos for Undo and Redo - CTRL + Z for Undo, and CTRL + Y for Redo. 

 

- OPTIONAL: Go the menu bar and select the 'Colours' drop-down menu to find the Brightness/Contrast option if you want to edit either of those aspects. You can also try the Hue / Saturation options on the Colours drop-down if you want to slightly shift the colours or make the tones more vibrant or muted using the Saturation slider.

- Go to the 'Layers' drop-down menu at the top and select 'New Layer' and then confirm (make sure you create a transparent layer (select 'Fill With' and then 'Transparency'.)
- On the Layers box on the bottom right, change the Mode of the top layer to 'Overlay'. If for whatever reason the Layers box isn't there, click CTRL + L to bring it up.

 

  

- You will see the Opacity is at 100%. Once you have picked your overlay colour, you can change the opacity until you like what you have.
 

- After you've done that, click Shift + B together and the selected tool will become Bucket Fill.
- On the top right of the screen, a box will come up with various options. Make sure that the 'Fill Type' is checked with 'FG Colour Fill' and the the 'Affected Area' section is checked with 'Fill whole selection'. 

Now it's time to pick the colour of your overlay. 

 

Underneath the tools usually on the left are your Foreground Colour (top left) and Background Colour (bottom right). Click the Foreground colour and change it and then click OK.

 

Once you're done, click within the image space and you will notice the colour change! Now go back to the Layers box in the bottom-right and adjust the Opacity slider of the top single-colour layer to your liking.

 

 

You can also get funky with overlays and make them multiple colours. For this you can use GIMP's Gradient Fill function!

 

IMPORTANT: Go careful with overlays as sometimes they can make darker skintones look ashy, colourwashed or lightened.

Gradient / Multiple Colour Overlay

 

For my old Xbox screenshots I often used a pink or light purple overlay, but why not try a gradient?

 

- Open your screenshot, go to the Layers dropdown, and select New Layer and click OK. Again, set the Layer Mode of the new Layer to Overlay.
- This time, press the G key to make 'Gradient Fill' come up in the top-right box! 

 

There's a few different options, a lot of them have preset colours, but unless you like one of the presets you're better off using your own colours.

 

You will need to select both a Foreground Colour and Background Colour on the Palette that's underneath the Tools on the top-left. 

 

Back to the gradient. There's a few different options for custom colours, but I am picking the option from the drop-down called FG to BG (RGB) which is just a simple gradient between both colours.

 

(You could always use the 'FG to Transparent' option if you only want the colour overlay on one part of the image and you want it to graduate in transparency.) 

Click on the image and it will come up with a line as well as a floating box with editable X and Y coordinates. You will have to experiment with this by moving the line around, direction-wise and length-wise. The shorter the line, the less smooth the gradient colours will graduate into one another.

 

 Once you're happy, press Enter to confirm.

 

 

It looks more magical with the pink and purple gradient overlay!

 

As well as the Overlay layer mode, you can also try:

- Multiply: Makes a darker overlay
- Screen: Gives a somewhat 'hazy' look to the overlay.
- Soft Light, Hard Light, Linear Light and Vivid Light all have various levels of intensity and vibrance that can be useful at lower opacities.

 

You can also overlay textures and images as well easily!

 

Image Overlays 

 

Find the image you want to overlay. Pixabay and deviantART are good places to check for overlays, but just check on deviantART what the uploader's rules are. You could do raindrops, rain, bokeh lights, paper texture, grain texture...anything really!

 

If you're using a texture from deviantART, Make sure the creator allows use off of deviantART and check whether or not credit to them is mandatory! I am using a rain overlay from this deviantART user. (Turns out I already put this exact same overlay on this image back in 2021, so you will notice in the finished image that it just makes the already-existing rain overlay look clearer...)

  

All you have to do is make a new layer, set it to Overlay, and then paste in your image. 

 

You may need to adjust the size and shape of the layer. If you select the highlighted tool and hold down your mouse button on it, you get this dropdown. Only a few of these will be useful for this and that's Flip, Rotate or Scale.

 

When it comes to scaling, the highlighted chain link can be clicked and 'split'. It is currently shown normal, which means it will scale uniformly. If you make the chain link broken, you can change the width and height independently, though this might lead to distortion.

 

Once you are done, go to Select and then pick 'None' to un-select it. If you can't do this, go to Layer and then 'To New Layer'. Then set this new layer to Overlay or whichever Mode you desire. After editing the brightness and contrast a bit and enlarging the overlay, the rain is...clearer, because I accidentally used the exact same overlay that I used on this originally, haha.

 

When it comes to single colours, colours I typically use for overlays are:

 

- Dark / mid-blue for night-time shots
- Purple / pink for Magic Realm Shots
- Light / pale blue for winter and snowy scenes. 

 

 

2. Sunny Day

Spice up your midday Spring / Summer pics with a few simple steps!

- Follow the instructions from earlier, making a New Layer, using Brightness/Contrast to edit that to your liking and adding a colour overlay of your choice, preferably a bright colour. 
- From there, make a New Layer. Then in the Toolbox, select the Airbrush tool and do the same as above- draw a 'rectangle' of yellow at the top.
- There is a Blur tool in the Toolbox (you can use Shift + U to make it the active tool) which you can use to blur the bottom of the rectangle to achieve a more gradual glow effect later on. Click the Paintbrush or Airbrush tool twice to bring up the various sliders- you'll probably need to change the size.

- Use CTRL + L to open the Layers box if it isn't already present, and then change the Layer Mode.
- Where you changed it to 'Overlay' last time, instead scroll down and use either 'Soft Light' or 'Vivid Light' (I used Soft Light since I preferred the effect).

Depending on your tastes, might be too bright, but it looks a lot nicer IMO!

3. Simple Magic Effects

Some simple things you can do for magic effects.

 

Here's a tutorial on how you can do fire glow using GIMP and edit fire into an image in a way that is cohesive. Refer to the 'Non-ReLight Non-GShade' section that just uses GIMP.

 

Flame Painter

 

Flame Painter website is here

 

This is covered in the above section, but the example image also uses GShade and ReLight so I'll redo it without so you can see the result. 

I used to play on this online tool all the time you can make cool magical-looking doodles with. You won't be able to draw this over your screenshot because you can only use the black BG, so it might not line up entirely the way you want it to.

 

This is the base screenshot we'll be using.

 

Experiment with Flame Painter's various sliders, you can mess with a lot of stuff and it's easier to just tell you to do this then explain the differences between them all. If you don't want symmetry make sure the symmtery slider on the bottom right says '0'. Make sure you don't change the background colour to white, it needs to be black.

 

Now we need to take a screenshot of it. Change the brush size to '1' since the brush cursor will get in the way otherwise and then use Windows's Snipping Tool and select the image, or use Print Screen and get the whole screenshot. 

 

IF YOU SELECTED TO PRINT SCREEN THE WHOLE SCREEN:
- Open it in GIMP by going to File > Create - From Clipboard.  
- Go to Layers > Transparency > Add Alpha Channel
- Press R to make the Rectangle Select Tool active. Select bits of the UI and then press CTRL + X to Cut them. Keep doing this until all you have left is the grey checker background (the transparency) and the black image with your Flame Painter design on it.

 

Now to Paste it in. 

 

- Now, open your Sims screenshot in GIMP. Paste in the Flame Painter image with CTRL + V and either click 'Select > None' or 'Layer > To New Layer' depending on whether or not it allows to to use 'Select > None'. 
- Go to Colours > Colour to Alpha. In the box that comes up make sure that you change the Colour from white to pure black (hex code 000000). Then click OK. This will seamlessly get rid of the black BG.

- Set the Layer Mode of the Flame Painter layer to either Addition, Soft Light, Hard Light, Vivid Light or Linear light, depending on which one you think looks nicest for your needs. Addition will most likely look nicest.

 

- Click M to select the Move tool and move the Flame Painter layer to wherever you want. 

 

- If you want to edit the Flame Painter layer's colours, use Colours > Brightness/Contrast, Hue/ Saturation or the Colours < Colorize feature, which makes more or less the whole layer one single shade and allows you edit the hue and saturation of it.

 

- Go to Layer > Layer to Image Size. This will make the layer boundaries the same as the screenshot.

It looks better, but we could add some more enhancements if we wanted to.

 

Overlay and Airbrush for glow

 

To make it blend a bit better, we can add some subtle glow.

 

- Make a New Layer. Set it to Overlay mode.
- Click A to bring up the Airbrush. Make sure your brush is set to one with low hardness.

 

You will want to draw around the magic and on the edges of anything you want to have a bit of 'glow' cast on it. You can also use the Blur / Sharpen tool to soften the edges of the airbrushed parts.

 

 

 

 On the bottom one, I drew some purplish airbrushing all around the magic, along Morgyn's arm, and on their face and across their side and leg. It now blends a bit better as you can see the glow on the magic on their face and body.

 

Useful distortion filters (found under Filters menu tab)

 

Distorts > Ripple

 

Blur > Linear Motion Blur

 

This is good for someone blasting magic to give it a bit more of a moving, action-packed feel. For this you will need to edit the original screenshot and then do the same edit on the Flame Painter layer.

 

- Press F to select the Free Select tool. MAKE SURE both Antialiasing and Feather Edges are checked. Set Feather Edges to any number between 18 and about 30. Select around the whole area that will be affected by the distortion of the magic.

 

- Go to Blur > Linear Motion Blur. Change the Length and Angle to what you want then click 'OK'.
- Do the same thing on the Flame Painter layer - select the magic area with Free Select, then Blur > Linear Motion Blur, set the settings to what you want then click OK. 

 

 It looks more action-y and also the magic looks more powerful too.

 

Supernova 

 

Bright lights go brrrr! 

 

- Open your Sims screenshot
- Make a new Layer. For now, set it to Addition.

- Go to Filters > Light and Shadow > Supernova.

 

There's a lot of options here. Use the line on the image with the two crosses on the end to move and change the supernova, like we did with the gradient.

 

- Random Hue: The higher the value, the more rainbow-y!
- Number of Spokes: Controls the amount of points on the supernova.
- Radius: Changes the size
- Random Seed: Changes the way the supernova looks. Best way I can describe that.

The glow is pretty wide, but we can change that:

 

- Press E for the Ellipse Select. Make sure Feather Edges is between 50 and 80.
- Select the area that you want the glow to remain.
- Go to Select < Invert
- then Cut.
- Go to Select < None.

 

 Better, but still looks a bit eh...

 

- click S for the Smudge tool.
- Make sure you have a fairly big brush and that Force is set to low (I set it to 19.)
- Smudge carefully around the edges of the supernova until the light is blended in a satisfactory manner.

 

Better! You can also do the overlay airbrushing effect underneath if you want for the magic glow.

 

 

4. File Size and Batch Conversion

Whether you're concerned about storage space on your PC, USB, or on your blog (given space limits on Wordpress etc) you might want to do what you can to keep file size to as much of a minimum as you can. There are multiple ways to go about this without losing too much detail.

 

Save your screenshots as .jpeg

To repeat what I said above, I love .png for its quality, but that mainly stems from me being an artist. For Sims screenshots, the average person won't notice much difference between .png and .jpeg (when it's not saved at a low quality, anyhow).

You have a couple of options for this:
- Do it manually in a program like GIMP (This is good to have more control over the .jpeg quality and compression)
- Use this program, Irfanview. It's a free program I've used a little bit before for various things, but I recently learned you can batch-edit a lot of images at once in various ways with this, which is great!

To save screenshots as .jpeg in GIMP:

1. Open up your image in GIMP. 
2. Go to the File tab at the top and scroll down to 'Export As'...
3. Change the .png at the end of the file name to .jpeg or .jpg. (Make sure it doesn't read as [image name].png.jpeg. To help prevent any issues, it must read as [image name].jpeg)
4. You will get a box come up about quality options. If you don't know what you're doing with it, don't touch any of the options other than potentially the Quality bar. Set the Quality bar number anywhere between 70 and 90, since I haven't noticed much difference with these numbers. Then click Export.
   
5. Your image will be saved as .jpeg. Since your file is a different type to the original, it shouldn't overwrite the .png version if they're stored in the same folder.
   

The resulting file size will very likely be smaller than the .png version. How much smaller depends on many factors. One of my screenshots was 727 KB as a .png, but as a .jpeg at Quality Level 70 it was only 92.7 KB. A lot of space saved and the image more or less looked the same. Even a max quality JPEG will at least usually be smaller than a .png.

 

Resizing your screenshots

In my game, my PC screenshots are 1920 X 991 when taken with the C key. That's a fairly big size. My XBox screenshots are 1280 X 720. 

On all of my stories up to 22/04/22, I actually don't have my screenshots displayed at their normal size. have them displayed at 'Extra Large' size, as I initally worried displaying them at their original size would cause issues with some blog layouts, or the mobile layout. Storage space is less of an issue on Blogger (As far as I'm aware, it's free so long as your image is under a certain size...but I don't know for sure), but if you don't need your screenshots to be huge you can easily resize them physically to help reduce file size. 

An XBox screenshot at Extra Large (not-full) size:

...and Original size. You likely won't notice the difference on mobile.

To resize your screenshots, you have multiple options:

 
- Do it manually in a program like GIMP (only worth doing if you only have a few screenshots)
-Use Irfanview. Since Irfanview can be used to both convert file types and resize images, I'll cover that after this bit. 

 

If you want to do this and batch-edit, then scroll down to 'Batch-editing picture size and file type using Irfanview'.

To do this in GIMP:

1. Open up your image in GIMP. 
2. Go to the Image tab in the top menu and locate 'Scale Image' in the drop-down menu.
3. A box will appear on the screen called 'Scale Image'. This box is shown below. The measurement is in pixels; it's best to keep it that way. Whatever you do, do not click the little chain-like shape next to either the Resolutions or Width/Height. The chain shape basically keeps the image 'uniform'. Otherwise you can change Width and Height independently of each other, and that might cause image shape distortion.
   
4. Change either the Width or the Height; the other number will change automatically after to keep the image 'uniform'. What size you change it to really depends on what size you need for your blog, image storage, etc. I would personally advise to not make the width any lower than 800 or 900.
5. After this, go to File and then 'Export As...' and export it as your preferred file type (I suggest either with .png.
   - FOR .png: There will be a box come up that says 'Export image as PNG'. Don't change any options, just click Export.
   - FOR .jpeg: There will be a box of quality options. Make sure the Quality number bar at the top is between 70 and 90 for decent results, no lower. then click Export.
   

...And those are some easy ways to save space without much (if any) loss of quality.

 

Batch-editing picture size and file type using Irfanview 

1. I suggest having a backup of your screenshots somewhere first before batch-editing anything!
   Go to File, and then scroll down to 'Batch Conversion/Rename.' This box will come up:

- This is a super quick and easy way to edit all your screenshots in one go. This isn't necessarily the most careful way to do it, but if you're not super-fussy or have hundreds of shots this is a good option!
- You can use 'Browse' underneath 'Output folder for result files' so all of the results of your conversions will go into that folder. You can also rename them, and even change the naming pattern in a way that's easier to sort or whatever.

- Batch Conversion Settings > Output Format will allow you to change what file type the resulting conversions will be. Ideally .jpeg. 

- If you tick 'Use advanced options for bulk resize', then click Advanced next to it, you can change a bunch of things in one go!

 

- This is where you can kill two birds with one stone and resize your images as well as changing the file type. (I'd suggest using the percentage-editing option, or if you're going to use the Width/Height, only change one of them, to ensure the image is 'uniform' when it resizes. You also have the option to overwrite the existing files upon being converted (GO CAREFUL) and an option to delete the original files after conversion. 

 

Make sure you send your new screenshots to a new folder instead of overwriting originals - one, in case you don't like the new versions, and two, it's quicker. 

 

There are other options for changes as well, but I wouldn't recommend batch-editing Brightness or Contrast or anything like that since different screenshots will look better with differing levels of brightness / contrast changes. I recommend doing all that manually, but that's just me. 

After I used this tool to convert a 1 gigabyte folder of screenshots to .jpeg, whilst keeping my originals, it shrank down from 1 gig to an amazing... 118 MB! Not bad for over 1200 images. However, using the Batch Conversion, I really noticed the quality difference...

I can really see the JPEG-y blurry-ness and that might not bother you, but it does bother me.
Maybe you don’t personally see a difference.

So the weigh-up of both options, is...

GIMP

- More specific, and can choose the quality of .jpeg to maximise quality and reduce file size as much as possible.
- A bit easier to change things if you've done something you don't like since you can just CTRL + Z and then save again.
- The slow way, not ideal if you've got hundreds of screenshots


IrfanView

- Great for quickly converting hundreds of screenshots at once

- Can change multiple things about the pictures in one go
- Less specific than editing in GIMP
- Bigger chance of possibly ruining your screenshots if you accidentally delete/overwrite them and edit them in a way that you don't like in the end. I would suggest not overwriting the original files until you've definitely ensured yourself the new ones are what you want.

5. Useful GIMP Filters and Options 

Covering options I haven't already spoken about. 

Under Colours menu tab

 

- Levels: Edit black / white levels
- Posterise: Gives a slightly comic-y look with less colours.
- Exposure: Can be used to darken shadows

 

Under Filters menu tab

BLUR
- Zoom Motion Blur: A motion blur around the edges. Good for action shots.
- Circular Motion Blur: The same but in a circle. Might be good for showing confusion or something.

DISTORTS
- Wind: Makes the image look windswept and spreads parts to one side.

 

LIGHT AND SHADOW

 - Bloom: gives a glowy look
- Vignette: Adds a soft border.
- Lens Flare: Does exactly what it says

 

NOISE
- Slur: Slur pixels and give a more dithered / chaotic look. Works well on fire effects.
- RGB Noise: Adds noise over the image. When the box for tool options comes up, you can change the mode of the Noise on (not the layer) to give a grainy look to the image.  

 

ARTISTIC

- Softglow: Similar-ish to Bloom
- Oilify: Makes it look painted
- Gimpressionist: Various options to make your screenshot look like a piece of art, but not the best tool. 

 

DECOR

- Old Photo: Make it look like an old browned photo.
- Add Border / Fuzzy Border: Does what it says on the tin 

 

 

 6. GMIC plugin

A free plugin for GIMP that adds a ton more editing options. The website has an .exe installer and a .zip file. Use the .exe installer since it's easier.

 

Once installed, if you go to the bottom of your Filters menu there will be a new option:  G'Mic - QT... let's look at some possible filters that might be useful.

 

This is the base screenshot.

 

Here are some useful things GMIC has that you can use for simple editing. Some of these easily replace the same options that are also on ReShade and GShade, like Colour Temperature editing.

 

The ones I highly recommend are in bold. 

 

ARTISTIC
- Bokeh: adds bokeh lights
- Brushify: Make it look like a painting (better than Gimpressionist)

 

BLACK & WHITE

- Pencil Portrait: Gives a pencil sketch look 

COLOURS
- Boost Fade: Seems to add a colour tone
- Colour Blindness: Lets you see what the colours will look like to someone with specific types of colour blindness, and can change the image to look like that.
- Colour Temperature: change between colder or warmer tones.
- Normalise Brightness: alters brightness , hard to explain.
- Sepia - changes to orange-brownish tones
- Vintage Style - similar to above
- Vibrance: makes colours deeper and brighter

 

DEFORMATIONS
- Breaks: looks like shattered glass or a mirror

 

DEGRADATIONS
- Chromatic Aberration: Adds the sort of red-greeny dodgy TV-ish blur
- Has a lot of blur options, including motion blur
- Add Grain: adds a graininess to the image, and is easier to do than the RGB Noise option earlier
- CRT: 3 different options, looks like an old TV screen.
- Rain and Snow: Adds rain and snow overlays and easier than the overlay option from earlier.

DETAILS
- Freaky Details: increases detail seemingly by enhancing light and dark a bit more.
- Quick Tonemap: alters the tones somehow.
- Multiple options to Sharpen the image.
- Texture Enhance: mostly seems to sharpen.

 

LIGHT AND SHADOW
- Equalize Light and Shadow: Hard to explain, but affects lighting.
- Dodge and Burn: Mostly darkens the image (burn) and brightens highlights more (dodge).
- Light Glow: adds a bit of glow
- Light Leaks: Looks a bit like a photo artifact patch of light
- Shadow Patch: Adds a bit of extra shadows across the image

 

REPAIR
- Anti Alias: the opposite of 'sharpen' essentially, smooths edges
- JPEG Smooth: Tries to fix some issues with very compressed JPEGs
- Unpurple: This is really good if you play on Console or if you do not use the NoBlu mod, since the unmodded game has something of a blueish filter over it. However, there might be a chance this can negatively effect lighting on skintones. Also not worth using if there's a lot of blue and purple that is necessary, like in the Magic Realm. It's probably better for portraits.

 

 

Left is normal, right is edited. Above shows Unpurple, and the below shows Freaky Details. 

 

 More examples below: Brushify (bottom) and Chromatic Aberration (top).

 

GMIC is amazing because it's free, easy to use and navigate, and because it can do a lot of the stuff that GShade and ReShade can do and because it does a lot of things people can sometimes rely on AI to do. GMIC IS YOUR BEST FRIEND if you don't want to use ReShade or GShade and if you can't or don't use lighting mods! 

 

 Freaky Details shown on the Morgyn screenshot. Really makes everything pop.