A GIMP dodge & burn plug-in: simple, nondestructive, UPDATED

UPDATE: Now there are downloads for GIMP 3 and GIMP 2

GIMP 3 has a completely different approach to plug-ins. So see below for the version of the plug-in that is appropriate for which version of GIMP you’re using.

Why do we need a plug-in to dodge and burn in GIMP?

GIMP has built-in dodge and burn tools. However, they work destructively. You have to use them on a pixel (image) layer. Working with image/pixel layers makes selective dodging and burning much more difficult than it needs to be. It also increases file size bloat unnecessarily.

Coming from Photoshop, I’ve used a couple of non-destructive dodging and burning techniques. My go-to depends on a single 50% grey layer set to soft light mode, where I use a brush to paint white (dodging) and black (burning). Another technique uses two separate curves layers to lighten and darken. However in GIMP, that curves technique is unfortunately destructive because it requires applying curves to image layers, instead of using separate curve adjustment layers like in Photoshop.

So I created this simple plug-in to make it easier and more flexible to dodge and burn in GIMP.

What languages is the plug-in available in?

This dodge and burn plug-in for GIMP 3 is available in the following languages. You don’t have to do anything to see it in your language. GIMP will automatically load the correct translation of the plug-in (provided you follow the installation instructions below).

• Nederlands (Dutch)
• English
• Français (French (Français)
• Deutsch (German)
• Italiano (Italian)
• Magyar (Hungarian)
• 日本語 (Japanese)
• Polski (Polish)
• Português (Portuguese)
• Español (Spanish)
• Українська (Ukrainian)
• 简体中文 (Chinese (Simplified))
• 繁體中文 (Chinese (Traditional))

If you have any suggestions to improve those translations, please leave a comment below.

The .pot localisation file is included with the downloadable .zip file for the GIMP 3 version of this plug-in. If you generate localisation files for additional languages, please share them!

Why is dodging and burning so important?

By selectively brightening and darkening different areas of an image, photographers create contrast and guide the viewer’s eye around an image.

Dodging and burning are two of the oldest and most important photo editing techniques. They selectively brighten (dodge) or darken (burn) different areas of an image. These techniques are used in darkroom film printing, where photographers selectively manipulate the exposure on a print.

In digital photography, dodging and burning can be applied using any photo editing software, including GIMP. The tools differ among the various editing software options, but the principle is the same: dodging lightens areas in a photo, whereas burning darkens.

Dodging and burning comes into play in almost every type of photography, most especially in photographs of people and landscapes. Dodging and burning contour faces and bodies by accentuating light and shadow. Similarly, in landscape photography, dodging and burning helps photographers focus the viewers’ eyes on specific areas, emphasise 3D illusions, and enhance drama.

How this GIMP dodge and burn (soft light) plug-in works

The plug-in creates a single layer filled with 50% grey, set to soft light mode. It inserts that layer directly above whatever layer is currently selected. You could of course do that manually. This plug-in simply saves you a bunch of steps and makes it easier to dodge and burn in GIMP.

50% grey and soft light means that any painting you do on that layer only affects luminosity. Because the layer is set to soft light mode, you see the image as you edit it. I paint with a soft brush and low force to build up light and dark selectively. You can use whatever method you want.

Use the brush tool and pure white or pure black to paint on the layer to lighten with white, or darken with black. You can use any opacity or other brush settings you want. However I find that 100% opacity and a very small force setting work best: setting the brush to a very gentle application with a low force setting allows me to dodge and burn gradually.

You can also adjust the opacity of the dodge and burn layer to reduce the overall effect, if you want.

Here’s an example showing the original image, the dodge and burn soft light layer (set to normal mode so you can see it), and the after image. Note that when the dodge and burn layer is set to soft light mode, it’s not visible but you can work on it, so you can see immediately how your brush strokes affect the image.

A note about how this plug-in works in GIMP 3

It seems that GIMP 3 handles soft light mode a little differently than Photoshop. GIMP’s soft light mode darkens a layer slightly but noticeably. To counteract this, the plug-in adds a brightness/contrast filter with a very low increase in brightness. You can adjust the brightness of that non-destructive filter if the default brightness increase isn’t enough or is too much.

Why GIMP 3 darkens slightly with soft light mode:

• GIMP’s soft light mode applies a more aggressive contrast adjustment compared to Photoshop. It treats 50% gray as a neutral point, but its implementation leans slightly toward darkening rather than maintaining perfect neutrality.
• Some users have noted that GIMP’s soft light mode behaves closer to hard light in certain cases, meaning it amplifies shadows more than expected.
• Gamma correction and color space differences between GIMP and Photoshop can also contribute to subtle variations in how blending modes affect an image.

Why Photoshop doesn’t darken with soft light mode:

• Photoshop’s soft light mode is more balanced, ensuring that 50% gray remains truly neutral—it neither darkens nor lightens the image significantly.
• Adobe’s blending mode calculations are fine-tuned for smoother transitions, which prevents unwanted darkening when applying soft light.

How to install this plug-in

(If you run into any problems with any of the steps below, please let me know in the comments below.)

1. Download the plug-in

Download the GIMP dodge and burn plug-in as a ZIP file. You’ll extract it as described below in the next section:

2. Copy the downloaded file to where GIMP looks for plug-ins

This is something you have to do for every plug-in you add to GIMP. I discovered that the only reliable way is as follows.

Find where GIMP looks for plug-ins:

1. Open GIMP if it’s not already open and select Edit > Preferences in the GIMP menu.
2. In the Preferences dialog, scroll down the list on the left until you find Folders, then click on the expand icon in front of the word to expand that list.
3. Scroll down the list of folders and select Plug-ins.
4. Still in the Preferences dialog, on the Plug-in Folders panel on the right, select the plug-in folder that’s listed for your user name.
5. Click on the “Show file location in the file manager” to open your computer’s file manager.
6. Copy the .ZIP file you downloaded into that folder and extract it there. You should see a subfolder named “dodge-and-burn-soft-light” (GIMP 2) or “dodge-and-burn-soft-light-v3” (GIMP 3). The plug-in is inside that folder (see the note below for why it should be in its own subfolder). Don’t move it, just leave it in that subfolder.
7. Files downloaded from the internet or transferred across systems may not retain their “executable” flag, especially on UNIX-based systems like Linux and macOS. The .py file needs the correct permission to be executed as a script. It’s a quirk of the different operating systems’ security models.
   • Linux:
     You should be able to right click on the .py file and set the permission to allow it as an executable (see below for an example screenshot). Or you could set it in your Terminal app with the command chmod +x [PATH TO WHERE YOU EXTRACTED THE PLUG-IN FOLDER]/dodge-and-burn-soft-light/dodge-and-burn-soft-light.py (GIMP 2) chmod +x [PATH TO WHERE YOU EXTRACTED THE PLUG-IN FOLDER]/dodge-and-burn-soft-light-v3/dodge-and-burn-soft-light-v3.py (GIMP 3). For example, with GIMP 3 I extracted the plug-in folder into a subfolder of Documents, so the command would be chmod +x "Documents/GIMP plug-ins/dodge-and-burn-soft-light-v3/dodge-and-burn-soft-light-v3.py".
   • macOS:
     Apparently, in macOS, there’s no visual way to mark a file as executable. You have to do it via Terminal. It’s not difficult, here’s how:
     1. Quit GIMP.
     2. Open the Terminal app.
     3. Enter this command: chmod +x "[PATH TO WHERE YOU EXTRACTED THE PLUG-IN FOLDER]/dodge-and-burn-soft-light/dodge-and-burn-soft-light.py" (GIMP 2) or chmod +x "[PATH TO WHERE YOU EXTRACTED THE PLUG-IN FOLDER]/dodge-and-burn-soft-light-v3/dodge-and-burn-soft-light-v3.py" (GIMP 3). The quotation marks are important if you have any spaces in your path to the .py file. For example, in GIMP 3 I extracted the plug-in folder into a subfolder of Documents, so the command would be chmod +x "Documents/GIMP plug-ins/dodge-and-burn-soft-light-v3/dodge-and-burn-soft-light-v3.py".
     4. Press Enter.
     5. If you don’t see any error messages, that’s good.
     6. Open GIMP.Check the Layer menu – if the dodge and burn plugin menu item is there, success!
8. Switch back to the GIMP Preferences dialog, and select the “Add a new folder” icon, then click on the icon for “Open a file selector to browse your folders” to … open a file selector to browse your folders.
9. In the file selector, navigate to the dodge-and-burn subfolder you added already, select it, and click OK. You should see something like this (a Windows screenshot but the same principle holds true for Linux and macOS):

Click OK in the Preferences dialog to close it. When you close the Preferences dialog you’ll be prompted to restart GIMP for the change to take effect.

3. Register the plug-in with GIMP

Now you have to register the plug-in with GIMP: just close and re-open GIMP.

If all has gone according to plan, you should find a menu entry called Layer > Dodge and burn. If not, please leave a comment below.

4. Create a keyboard shortcut (optional)

If you want to assign a keyboard shortcut to this GIMP dodge and burn plugin, go right ahead.

Why it’s important to follow these steps

The GIMP instructions I found online conflicted with my reality. Everywhere I looked, the instructions for adding scripts to GIMP said to open the Preferences dialog and look for the relevant folder(s) where GIMP was supposed to be configured to look for plug-ins, and install a new plug-in .py file in that folder. But either those folders didn’t exist, or GIMP ignored them.

Furthermore in some versions of GIMP (eg Windows, 2.99+) you have to add the subfolder where you’ve saved the plugin file to the list of folders where GIMP looks for plugins, and that folder needs to be named exactly the same as the plug-in with that subfolder.

This appears to be a relatively recent change to how GIMP works, and it’s not obvious. Since that’s the future of GIMP, we’ll just take it as a requirement from now going forward.

This is an example of how working with free software isn’t entirely free—you have to do some of the work that other systems automate, and put your thinking cap on. Bear in mind that GIMP is developed and maintained by volunteers who donate their time and talents as and when they can. So sometimes documentation lags behind development.

What do you think?

Please let me know if you have any questions or thoughts you want to share in the comments below.

FAQ

Why do I need the GIMP dodge and burn (soft light) plug-in?

The GIMP dodge and burn plug-in makes it easy to dodge and burn non-destructively and flexibly. Your dodge and burn edits remain on a single layer, and you can modify them whenever you want. The GIMP dodge tool and GIMP burn tool both work destructively, meaning they make changes directly to an image layer that can’t be undone later.

What is the best way to dodge and burn in GIMP?

Download and install the GIMP dodge and burn plug-in. It creates a single layer filled with 50% grey and set to soft light mode. 50% grey and soft light means that any painting you do on that layer only affects luminosity. Because the layer is set to soft light mode, you see the image as you edit it. You paint with a soft brush and low force to build up light and dark selectively.

Why should I use the GIMP dodge and burn (soft light) plug-in instead of GIMP’s dodge tool and burn tool?

The GIMP dodge and burn soft light plug-in creates a separate dodge and burn layer so you can work non-destructively; you don’t change the image pixels. You can undo any dodging and burning without affecting the underlying image. On the other hand the GIMP dodge tool and GIMP burn tool both work destructively directly on image layers. Destructive editing is difficult or impossible to undo.

How do I install the GIMP dodge and burn soft light plug-in?

Download the dodge and burn plug-in: dodge-and-burn-soft-light.zip. Copy the downloaded file to where GIMP looks for plug-ins and extract the contents into a separate subfolder. Register the plug-in with GIMP: close and re-open GIMP. Check to make sure the Layer > Dodge and burn layer (soft light) menu item is visible.