LOMO Effect in GIMP 2.4

Well, Christmas time is almost here. In fact, it's tomorrow! If you are like me though, you still have lots to do to get ready. Despite how busy I have been, I did find some time a couple of days ago to play with version 2.4 of the GIMP on my computer. I recently saw some pictures taken with an old Lomo camera which I liked. These old Russian cameras definitely are not known for their optical quality and that partly is the draw to pictures taken with them. Now, I do not own a Lomo camera and, since I actually shoot everything in digital now, I wanted to figure out a way to replicate the 'look' of this style of photo. After a little research on the web, I found a website that had a download link for a LOMO plug-in to use with the GIMP.

After downloading the plug-in and some practice, I decided to create a B&W Lomo 'style' picture. I first took a picture of a juniper I shot in Arches National Park and converted it to B&W. In order to use the plug-in, I then converted the picture to RGB again. After running the plug-in, I added a soft focus layer and a little film grain to simulate a vintage pic. Here is the result below.