FINE TEXTURES AND PHOTOGRAPHIC OVERLAYS TO ENHANCE YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY AND MORE


Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Forgetmenot


I was thrilled to find these still in flower in my garden a couple of weeks back, usually I'd have to wait till spring to see them but our winter here in Dunedin has been relatively mild so far, but as the old saying goes "as the days grow longer, the cold grows stronger" and we often find that this is the case.

Sorry, I don't do long posts  like Paul in his blog posts or rambles as he puts it,  there's only so much you can write about flowers after all, but I was surprised when I did the  mouse-over of this one how dark the original photo was compared to the finished one.
*notes to self to try this recipe again*

Gelato Ice @ hardlight 36%
Orange Blossom@ softlight 100%
Copy of background @ soft light 100%
Peacock @ screen 53 % masked from the focus areas.

See it on Flickr

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Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Lemon preserve jars


Our supermarket had a stock of large, knobbly photogenic Lemons, which inspired me to use a few in a new still life.
I have no fancy lighting, I just use daylight from a side window with the Mediterranean shutters most people have, mine are both internal and external. I can direct the light by opening one or both part way, but the same can be done with curtains, you don't need to have shutters!

I shot this in my little kitchen where the walls have their original gloss cream paint, which I expect has faded from its original white!
Before you go thinking "does this guy ever decorate"? I'd answer cheerfully that I've purposely left the original retro finish as I had photographic location shooting in mind!;-)

Back to the shoot, its just the fridge top, no need for fancy marble or stone slabs! The refection at first bothered me but in hindsight its added to this simple grouping.
During my scenic artist career in London I had a big scenic paint order to decorate several huge sheets of plywood for a famous British lighting catalogue. The eccentric photographer worked in a windowless WW2 Air raid shelter, his results were stunning, simply by wiring the wall lights through my sheets of scenically painted plywood and reflecting the light back with sheets of grubby white polystyrene, approx 2" thick. Normally one side would have a coat of Black Matt emulsion, he used this to reflect black or negative light.. I digress, here I used two sheets of Polystyrene from my new LED monitor. No need to buy reflectors and you'll help save the planet!
I shot bending down to the same low level, no tripod needed but probably would have helped!

The before shot shown has already had a few pale textures but unfortunately I didn't save half the recipe but will give approximate percentages for the before state.
The original picture was perfectly focused, here I had purposely softened the image with Gaussian blur and painted out the blurred insides of the objects leaving the outside edges slightly blurred.

In the second half of the recipe I used Sisley, our dramatically ugly painted Linen texture in an unusual way, firstly it was desaturated to a dark blue, then It was used with the rarely used, Pin Light mode at just 11% I loved the bottom part but the top wasn't showing so I flipped it vertically and softly removed the bottom half. A later layer of Creme Anglaise partly obscured this, but all the layers add up to form a kind of heavy impasto final effect.

First half recipe

Lime Wall - Soft Light @ 50% Approx - flipped vertically
Orange Blossom - Soft Light @ 50% Approx
Heather - Soft Light @ 50% Approx

Second half recipe

Sisley - Pin Light @ 11% Desaturated to dark blue
Sisley - Pin Light @ 14% Desaturated to dark blue, flipped vertically, the bottom half removed.
Creme Anglaise - Screen @ 47%
Base image copy - Overly @ 27% totally desaturated to B/W

See bigger or purchase cards and prints on Redbubble

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$180
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$100 for Tex Box One and Two and the Fly Edges
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Combo Pack Offer
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Monday, June 13, 2011

Pretty pastels


This is another lensbaby photo, I love the extreme bokeh the lens produces as well as the unpredictability of the results, I also love how well lensbaby shots work with textures.
Okay, the recipe and it was a fairly simple one, only one texture and one of the blending modes was one you'd not expect.

Gelato Ice @ colour burn 100%
Gelato Ice @ Hard light 88% gently removed from the focus areas using a layer masked
Copy of background @ Overlay 64%
Curves layer to tweak tone and contrast
....and it was done! 
Gelato Ice is from the Spring Painterly Pack.
See it a little bigger on Flickr

Spring Painterly Pack
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$40
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Summer Painterly Pack
36 large textures for only $40
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Complete Flypaper Package
Tex Box 1, Tex box 2, Fly Edges, Summer Painterly & Spring Painterly
$180
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Flypaper Triple Combo Deal
$100 for Tex Box One and Two and the Fly Edges
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Combo Pack Offer
Only $65 for Tex Box One and  Tex Box Two
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Thursday, June 9, 2011

jug and fresh soap


One of my greatest little luxuries is a really hot deep bath!
And then from that bath my favorite view would have to be of freshly scrubbed, bleached pine tops, scented with French hand made lavender soap. So I'm lucky, here in my little French house to have such a bathroom!

The thick pastel coloured oil painting on rough stretched linen behind the Habitat sourced bowl has only just dried after several months and was added for height. The water jug is antique English.
Normally I'd have an antique shaving mirror, but that's for a future picture! :-)
The French white painted antique washstand was purchased from Ebay France, I liked the two little underside drawers, where little things can be hidden.

Shot this morning in reflected sunlight, no tripod needed.

Recently we've been crazy about Lensbaby pictures, however, they can be a bit hit and miss, so I've come across another way of softening images before texturing to get a nice dreamy, hazy effect. Its simple, just use the old Orton effect free action at our friends Coffeeshop before the use of textures!

The before image above has already been desaturated, than a gentle Orton effect applied. The finished image has just two textures from Tex Pack 2.

Lime Plaster
- Soft Light @ 47% - Flipped vertically
Copy of base image Soft Light @ 30%
Lost Void - Screen @ 47% - Flipped vertically.

See it larger on Flickr

Spring Painterly Pack
40 Large Textures (38 square and two huge rectangles) for only
$40
Add to Cart

Summer Painterly Pack
36 large textures for only $40
Add to Cart

Complete Flypaper Package
Tex Box 1, Tex box 2, Fly Edges, Summer Painterly & Spring Painterly
$180
Add to Cart

Flypaper Triple Combo Deal
$100 for Tex Box One and Two and the Fly Edges
Add to Cart

Combo Pack Offer
Only $65 for Tex Box One and  Tex Box Two
Add to Cart

Fly Edges Pack
Only $40
Add to Cart

See all our packs and deals on one Page