Gimp: layers for dummies

Well I guess my long, stubborn resistance to learning a layers-based photo editor like PS is fading. Mainly because GIMP is free and it seems to be a fairly powerful program. I am very comfortable with Lightroom. I opened it the first time three years ago and it was a match made in heaven. Most of it seemed to just make sense. I get dizzy looking at GIMP/Photoshop.

1. Can anyone recommend any good YouTube videos for giving an overview of how to learn Gimp? Maybe some practical excercises or something?

2. I shot some group portraits yesterday and need to copy one face off Mr. Blinks-a-lot and paste it onto another photo. unfortunately the camera composition is slight off between the two photos so I can't do that layer thing where I'd just erase one head and the layer from below pops through, though I would eventually like to learn this. Can anyone recommend the easiest way to paste from one photo to the next? Free select tool? Do I need to put the pasted face on a new layer? Or can it go on the 'home' layer?

Thanks!

Silver-Halide wrote in post #17917452
Well I guess my long, stubborn resistance to learning a layers-based photo editor like PS is fading. Mainly because GIMP is free and it seems to be a fairly powerful program. I am very comfortable with Lightroom. I opened it the first time three years ago and it was a match made in heaven. Most of it seemed to just make sense. I get dizzy looking at GIMP/Photoshop.

1. Can anyone recommend any good YouTube videos for giving an overview of how to learn Gimp? Maybe some practical excercises or something?

2. I shot some group portraits yesterday and need to copy one face off Mr. Blinks-a-lot and paste it onto another photo. unfortunately the camera composition is slight off between the two photos so I can't do that layer thing where I'd just erase one head and the layer from below pops through, though I would eventually like to learn this. Can anyone recommend the easiest way to paste from one photo to the next? Free select tool? Do I need to put the pasted face on a new layer? Or can it go on the 'home' layer?

Thanks!

I havent used gimp in ages but if it still works like it did, and most layers based editing programs do, when you paste something it goes Into a new layer. Then you can adjust the placement, then using a layer mask decide how much of the pasted in image to show. Then flatten the layers onc3 you are hqppy, into one single layer.

http://www.gimp.org/tu​torials/