i used gimp before i got photoshop, gimp is pretty great
a lot of stuff in photoshop is really easy to use though, like the content aware brush, it's amazing
I love GIMP, too, and I used it as a pre-Photoshop, despite never actually owning Photoshop (I use it at school). I never understood why people say it's user-unfriendly, since I think the opposite. I just said that in my quote because that's what the typical person would say. I should get back to image editing, though, so I might try out some of these exercises. :)
also when you say the content aware brush you mean the healing tool right
I haven't used PS in a while so idk.