It's a little long, but I think you'll like it.
Greg

01) Create a square image. (500x500 in my example)
02) Layer > Transparency > Add Alpha Channel.
03) Select > Select All (Ctrl+A)
04) Fill the selection with black using paint bucket (Shift+B)
05) Select > None (Shift+Ctrl+A)
06) Run the Rule of Thirds Script if you have it and skip to step 11. (Script is available here http://www.gimptalk.com/forum/article/My-First-Two-Scripts-9448.html )
07) Image > Guides > New Guide by Percent > Horizontal 33%
08) Image > Guides > New Guide by Percent > Horizontal 67%
09) Image > Guides > New Guide by Percent > Vertical 33%
10) Image > Guides > New Guide by Percent > Vertical 67%
11) Using rectangular Selection Tool (or press R key) and select the first square (1 of 9).
12) Select > Shrink > 5 pixels
13) Select > Rounded Rectangle > 10%
14) Select > Feather > 10
15) Cut out the selection (Ctrl+X)
16) Repeat steps 11 - 14 for the remaining 8 squares.

17) Rename the layer as "Rubiks Frame" and duplicate layer twice. (Total of 3 layers)
18) Load the three selected images as layers. (Ctrl+Alt+O)
19) Resize each and crop to 500x500.
20) Alternate the layers as Rubiks Frame, Picture 1, Rubiks Frame copy, Picture 2, Rubiks Frame copy #2, Picture 3

21) Merge Layers 1 & 2 together, 3 & 4 together, and 5 & 6 together.
22) Right click on "Picture 1" layer and select "New Layer", name layer "Cube" and click on ok. (Pictures don’t show correct name.)

23) Filters > Map > Map object.
24) Map to: Box
25) Click Transparent Background button. (you should only see the checkerboard pattern in preview window)
26) Click Box Tab
27) Set Front and Back to Picture 1
28) Set Top and Bottom to Picture 2
29) Set Right and Left to Picture 3
30) Click Light Tab
31) Set Light to directional
32) Click Orientation Tab
33) Under Rotation Set X= 20
34) Under Rotation Set Y= -25
35) Under Rotation Set Z= 0
36) Click Preview (Now you should see your current cube design)

37) Experiment with the X, Y and Z rotations. (Preview after each change)
38) Click "ok" when you are happy with the preview result. (Can take a minute or two)
39) Turn off the 3 "picture" layers
40) Turn off the grid lines (Shift+Ctrl+T).
41) Right click on "Picture 1" layer and select "New Layer", name layer "Back" and click on ok.
42) Fill layer with background color (or pattern) of choice. (Shift+B)
Note: If using pattern you might want to use the perspective tool (Shift+P) to give dimension to background.
43) Click on "Cube" layer.
44)with GIMP 2.2 Script-Fu > Shadow > Drop Shadow >

but with GIMP 2.4 Filter/Light and shadow/Drop Shadow

Offset X = 25
Offset Y = 25
Blur Radius = 25
Color = Black (Default)
Opacity = 80% (Default)
Turn off "Allow Resizing"

45) Click Drop-Shadow layer.
46) Click shear icon (Shift+S)
X= -250
47) Click scale Icon (Shift+T)
Width = 649
Height = 200
48) Click on move tool (or press M key) Position shadow where you would like it.
49) You can also vary opacity of "Drop-Shadow" layer if you'd like
50) Click links on "Cube" and "Drop-Shadow" layers (Next to eye)
51) Still using the move tool, drag cube and shadow to place it where you'd like.

The result is really nice! Thanks for posting it; I might try it. :l:

Wow Nice Il Post My Result When Im Finished

On my original, I created duplicate of the cube layer, did a threshold on it, cleaned it up to just be the black cube with white faces and did a bump map of the cube layer using the threshold copy as the source.

Hope you like it.
Greg

Nice tutorial! :l: Amazing!

But by the way, the image you posted above has wrong perspective along with the pine stuff. :w:

hehe, that is really cool PhotoMaster. Very well done and an excellent use of Map Object. :h:

my result ^ :l:

yup...map object doesn't map very well to sphere (i fear that if its developer read my previous comments about how it maps to sphere...then it may have developed also sort of homicide instinct against me..i was a bit heavy... )but it works well with cubes

...nice tut :h:

This is a very good tutorial. I am gonna have to try this. I think you could even possibly animate the sections of the cube spinning like a real rubic's cube (though doing it in Gimp would be a lot of work, evan with GAP).

@ClayOgre

Doing it in perspective sounds like a really massive work for GAP ... one of those instances where going full 3D is probably worth the hassle even if one has to learn Blender in the process... ^_^;

@PhotoMaster

Nice tutorial and a fun result! Be careful when placing the cube on a surface though, so that the perspective comes out right.
.
Griatch

@Sydney
Your cube looks great! Was the tut easy enough to follow?

@ Kwin and Griatch
It took me a moment to understand what you were talking about. I changed the perspective of the pine surface to make it forshortened and didn't think to distort the cube the same. (cube doesn't have the same depth as the table top) Thank you both for pointing this out to me.

Greg

Photomaster - This is a great tutorial! This is the one you told me about? I'm going to give it a shot right away, if I can keep my eyes open long enough. I already installed your 10% scripts. Thank you for sharing this G.

This was fun to make. I used a couple of my kaleidoscope images. I'll clean up and tweak the image later but for now, I wanted to show what I ended up with by following the steps. The tutorial was easy to follow and very effective.

:h: Cool..ilike the colours...and then i like kaleidoscope too
That on the right with the blue star is really catchy

Great cube! I love the colors and I especially like the one on the front/right face.I agree with PhotoComix on the blue star.
Greg

I am having so much fun with the Rubik Cube tutorial. I went all out on this one.

how long does it take

@ Angela - Amazing! I love the crazy colors! Now I just need some coolaid :w: and I'm all set.

@ Hollisterpolak - The single longest part is step #38, waiting a minute or two for the program to actually map out the cube. Each time I do it it goes quicker,as it becomes more automatic for me. How long it will take depends on the user and the machine that it's done on.

Greg

I decided to take a more traditional approach.

Thank You Photomaster, great Tut,
Also I think that ClayOgre has done something similar in another Tut with a spinning cube with a spinning rubic in the sides . If that is the case CO, can you do a Tut for that? I could not find it.
Here is mine. Note the little white gap at the front where the three sides meet . I thought that I would be smart and do a rounded corner on the 400X 400 grid to give a rounded corner as you would find on a real rubic cube. Big mistake but I couldnt be bothered starting again.
Cheers Wbool 63

NB this is a very resource hogging exercise, my machine dies if I attempt a 500X500

Interesting tutorial. Might try later, really good outcomes. :)

How do I download that rule of thirds script? The link you gave is just a bunch of text, what do I do?
looks great but I can't do anything until I get that script.

Hi Frodo, If you highlight the text and do a copy, (right click and copy on my machine) and paste it into a blank text document (I use notepad) and save it in your scripts folder (C:\Program Files\Gimp-2.2\share\gimp\2.0\scripts) and save it with an scm extension (xxxxx.scm). In notepad you need to set document type to all or it will name it xxxxx.scm.txt . If it does, just rename it without the txt.

Greg

Hi, In order to make it map faster and use less resources, so you can make a bigger cube, do NOT map the Back, Bottom and one of the Side faces. These faces are not shown and can be mapped as blank. Obviously if you want to show the bottom face then do not map the top face. In other words only map the map the faces you will show . See Photomaster's Tutorial steps 27,28 and 29.

Cheers WBOOL63

Added later, NO, I am wrong, there is no difference in time. I timed mapping with One face as compared to mapping with SIX faces and there is no difference. Perhaps some background task was running that skewed my figures last time.I timed it

Cheers

I read the Rubik tutorial. Very cool. I'm new to "The Gimp".
\I learn a lot so far.
Actually I'm more of programmer / linux web server set up stuff.

Anyway. I could not get the Filters > Map > Map Object tool to work.
Once I hit the box tab things freeze up.

I'm running Gimp on a Dell Inspiron laptop (512 megs of RAM) p3 800
Fedora Core 7. I installed Gimp from using yum.

Thank,
cdub1885

This might be a double post.