free 2d software The gimp

for those of you that do not have a 2d graphics program here is a solution http://www2.arnes.si/~sopjsimo/gimp/faq.html read the first section of the faqs then your ready to donwload and install from here http://www2.arnes.si/~sopjsimo/gimp/stable.html . this program is not a photoshop replacement but it is really close. from what i could see with my quick tests: this program supports every popular file format, its layer base like photoshop, supports channels, and history palatte. there is more but i have not had time to look. the only thing that is of real relevance to galciv i could not figure out was if this app could save pal file. but other then that seems like a great program.