Rhododendrons

This is a shot I took in a friend's beautiful garden many years ago.  I played with the lighting and then converted it to black and white.  I liked the look of it, however, and wanted to play some more so I added some colour, some texture and a brush that I made myself (new bit of learning!).  And a frame.  It's a wee bit skewed but that's ok.  I'm learning and that's the most fun and I know how to fix it for next time.

I have been given a surgery date for very early in the new year!  I'm pretty excited at the thought of being able to go for walks again!  I have saved a class I recently purchased about art on the iPhone so I will tackle that whilst recovering since I won't be at my kitchen table for a few months.  I won't be able to bend forward (as in over my computer) for a while.  And my old cell phone is about 15 years old so I am looking at getting an iPhone, mostly for the picture taking capabilities (is that silly?).  Looking forward to the class, however!

You know I'll be back.

Do you know Anna Aspnes?

Anna Aspnes is an amazing designer and I totally love her style.  Check it out:

http://www.annaaspnesdesigns.com/

Check out the link to her blog and you can also sign up for her newsletter.  She also has a youtube channel where her videos show you, in a clear and easy to follow manner, how to use all the various bits and pieces of her kits.  It is really worth visiting her site if her style appeals to you.  Well, even if it doesn't, because it's fun to see what Anna and others are producing in this style.  So many possibilities.

I made this piece using a template from one of her kits.  It comes as a PSD file, so you can edit, change, re-arrange, re-colour,  etc. any or all the various layers.  I still have so very much to learn, but it was fun taking some of my own photos and creating this page.  Great for creating travel memories. Of course, she has kits for all kinds of seasons and holidays, events and even non-events,  just to celebrate a moment.  It's fun.

You know I'll be back.

http://www.annaaspnesdesigns.com/

Still poking along.

I am still pretty much confined to my kitchen table.  There is Netflix and there is Photoshop.  And there is rain.  All of it conducive to a bit of creative play.  (Well, except for the Netflix part, but then a break now and again is great, don't you think!)

This is a piece I worked on today.  There is a lot of content provided in the courses I am taking and I have also purchased some pics of models from the Colby Files, a photographer in Arizona.  He also provides content to the courses but this pic I purchased, and then added lots and lots of other bits and pieces.  Layers, masks, overlays, blending.  Fun!

We set the clocks back tonight, which means I get an extra hour to play tomorrow.  Hmmmm, wonder what I'll do.

I'll be back.

Just because I can

I am posting this now because I hope to post something similar in about a year to see whether or not I have progressed!  Bizarre??? Probably, but I tend to lose things you see, so this is as good a place to store it as any!  So, honestly, if you don't want to, you don't need to read any further.  Class dismissed!!!

This might not be a terribly exciting piece (sorry!) but for me, it is exciting in what it represents: my first pic that is a total compilation of bits and pieces.  I still have such a long way to go, but I feel as if this might represent the first few steps.  It will be a long journey I expect!  But it's a fun one, to be sure and one that has already brought me so much pleasure, here at my kitchen table.

This post represents a lot of studying, a lot of pondering, and a lot of experimenting.  I watch the videos that come with the various classes I am taking (at the moment, mostly classes falling under the umbrella of Sebastian Michael's classes, link below) and then I watch them again!  Trying to remember what steps to follow (my logical brain kicking in) I wake up early, too early, but then I HAVE to get up to see if I can figure out something that is bothering me about a piece.  In the above piece, for instance, I was trying to figure out how to darken just that little bit behind the model's head:  just a dark brush?, a curves adjustment on a black layer?, a 50% grey layer to selectively darken?, or (and this one often seems perfect) tossing the whole lot in the bin!  So I slept on it (sort of, I got up at three a.m. again, the problem nagging at my brain) and tried all of these (except the bin part), and I now know how to do all of them, without having to look it all up.  That's what I'm after.  I'm sure there are lots of other ways but it's a start!

The above pic contains purchased content and content provided for free with the course.

photoshopgrunge.com

Getting There

I am excited that I can mess about in Photoshop and not be having to look things up all the time....how to do this and that.  It's getting better.  Still such a far way to go, but there are times when it doesn't feel quite so overwhelming.

This is a shot taken not too far from where I live.  I am so lucky.  I've added many layers and effects, filters (smart and otherwise!), borders, etc etc.  Slowly but surely.

But for sure, I'll be back.

Window Dancing in the Fall.

I continue to move along on my Photoshop journey.  Still at my kitchen table.  It could be worse.  It is most definitely Fall and while we are having a lot of rain, we do seem to have some lovely periods of clear weather most days.  It is a beautiful season.  One of the layers I have used in this pic is a shot I took of a maple tree with its gorgeous golden leaves.  Some of the gold is showing on the shutter behind the dancer.  I like to think I have hidden a bit of the season in my image!

This is an image of a dancer that I extracted from some purchased material.  I then placed her on a window ledge from a picture taken in Avignon a couple of years ago.  Some layers, some shadows, some extra materials, messing about with frames again.  There is so much to learn and I seem to be most 'able' in the forgetting department.  Oh well, more practice.  And then more.  It's all good.

I'll be back.

Back to the Louvre

Oh my gosh, what did we do before digital photography??  Well, mostly I didn't....too much fuss and expense.  Now it's so easy.  So here I just brought up a photo I had taken in the Louvre a couple of years ago and I did a small rework.  I am still working on the extraction tools and haven't yet tackled anything as fussy as 'flying hair' but soon!  But a few extra layers, borders, backgrounds, overlays, tons of fun and c'est fini!  Such an interesting journey this is!

This pic had some other bits and pieces in the original that I can now remove easily (no flying bits here!....well, just the wings I guess)  and I am getting more comfortable with adding borders, lighting, etc.  Oh this does make living at my kitchen table so much more palatable!

I'll be back....