How to Crop a Person From a Picture Using GIMP

Nothing can ruin a great photo more than someone unexpectedly walking in front of your camera or making an unexpected move or gesture. If you are not able to retake the photo, image-editing software like the GIMP may help you to literally cut people out of the picture. The GIMP's Crop Tool can be used like a machete to slice off the unwanted person from your picture whereas the Ellipse Select Tool lets you remove the offending person with the precision of a surgeon while keeping as much of the original picture intact as possible.

Load the picture you want to crop.

Select the "Crop Tool" from the Tool Box.

Hold down the left mouse button and drag the cropping rectangle across the image until it encloses all the parts you want to keep while excluding the area containing the person you want left out. Fine-tune the area selected by holding down the left mouse button and dragging the upper left, upper right, bottom left or bottom right corners to include as much of the picture you want to save as possible.

Press the "Enter" key to crop your image.

Select the "Ellipse Select" from the tool box and place your mouse cursor near the person you want to remove from the image.

Hold down the left mouse button and drag the elliptical area across the person you want to remove.

Hold down the left mouse button and drag the upper left, upper right, bottom left or bottom right corners of the ellipse area until you get the closest possible fit around the person you want to remove.

Press "Ctrl-X" to remove the person from the picture. Although this will leave an elliptical hole the same color as the GIMP's default image background, you can color this empty area, use the Clone Tool to paint a background matching the surrounding area, add text on top of it or paste another image over it.