FINE TEXTURES AND PHOTOGRAPHIC OVERLAYS TO ENHANCE YOUR PHOTOGRAPHY AND MORE


Sunday, May 29, 2011

Cosmos


This comes hot off the press (or camera) so to speak.  Taken a couple of hours ago with my lensbaby while I was out walking. Winter is fast approaching here in New Zealand so I have to make the most of the lovely day we're having and finding these in flower was an added bonus.
And now that I've processed and posted this I'd better get back to tidying my own jungle of a  garden!

Fairly simple processing.
Sakura Skies  @ screen 18%
Pantheon Stone @ soft light 19% masked off the focus flower.
Syrinx @ Overlay 55%
Sakura Skies @ Overlay 100%
Curves layer to tweak tone
All textures are from the Spring Painterly pack.

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

Saturday, May 21, 2011

Women under Scaffolding


I'm no stalker, but when I see a great silhouette, and I'm armed with a camera, I will sometimes move just a few tiny paces to try to get a secret shot!

Our narrow medieval streets are perfect for this type of shot, though for the same reason our streets are often too shaded and thus too dark, and don't even get me started on my pet hate, parked cars! Here I used the trusty Lensbaby once more, lens wide open, at F1; no aperture. It was around 5pm, before the sun wasn't too low but also not directly overhead.

As we've been asked, Ive tried to recreate how I processed, step by step, and why I chose the textures used.

To the base image, to add more definition, I first slightly cross processed it and used a slight vignette darkening the edges. You can do this simply with free photoshop actions

To start with texturing I wanted to add more light. For my recent lensbaby shots I like to use the new Opal texture, here I used it twice, then I wanted to add a more beefy texture and darken the sky, I chose Tempest Sea, flipped vertically.
I loved the painterly/scratchy effect on the blue scaffolding covers brought by this texture, but found the overall blue a little too bright/fruity. So another favorite texture was pulled out, Newt to help tone down, which was okay but still not quite there, so I clicked it off. Finally I tried Swans Way for the first time, as I liked the look of that billowing canvas like movement this texture suggests, and Wow, happy days! It toned down the blue perfectly and pulled it all together and added a dramatic cracked grunge!

It was almost finished but decided there was now just a bit too much street clutter which the textures had highlighted.
So I clone tooled out a red road sign on the right, and a pale board on the left under the scaffolding, both clearly visible on the raw base image.

Opal - Overlay @ 74 % softly brushed from bottom edge and tot of sky
Opal - Overlay @ 100 % softly brushed from bottom edge and all of sky and right building
Tempest Sea - Overlay @ 45% Flipped vertically
Swans Way - Soft Light @ 100%

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

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Girl with teddies


In England I bought a full size double hospital X-ray light box from Ebay, cost me next to nothing, but boy did I get burnt for the extra baggage on the flight home!
So, I've been going through the old negatives, and came across this shoot with my niece, proudly showing her party outfit in their garden.
The late spring weather was very soft and thundery and she's looking up at me, being tall I don't think I'm standing on anything, but that would be the best way to get this effect yourselves!

The base negative scan has been though the CS5 HDR filter to brighten and slightly smooth the 35mm film grain, Ive also hand spot removed with the spot remover tool.
I scanned at 1200 DPI in Tiff mode, saved in 300 dpi in CS5 and converted this landscape format shot to 4000pixels high, cropping square. Using textures from both the Summer and Spring painterly Flypaper sets;

Pantheon Stone Overlay @ 49%
Creme Anglaise Normal @ 100% brushed from figure
Creme Anglaise Soft Light @ 54%
Brushed Rose Overly @ 100% desaturated and brushed from figure and top left
Iorek Ice Overlay @ 43%
Followed by a final use of curves to tweak tone.


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

Saturday, May 14, 2011

Grunge Hydrangea


I reprocessed this image for Mary's article over at the Digital Photography School,  to help illustrate how using different textures on the same image can  completely change the feel of a photo, it's one of the things textures are so useful for. The earlier version is much more soft, dreamy and subtle.
Anyway, here's what I did.....

Catacomb Frieze @ Overlay 100% masked from the jug
Lyme Fossil @ Overlay 100% masked carefully from the focus areas as desired
It looked okay like this but to give it more of a grunge feel I added a Fly Edge
Fly Edge 13 @ Overlay 100% this layer was inverted using the invert adjustment layer and masked from the central portion so the grunge didn't overwhelm the subject.
Catacomb Frieze and Lyme Fossil are from the Spring Painterly pack.
See it 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

Tuesday, May 3, 2011

at the watermark


Firstly, Jill and I would like to say a big Hi to the fans of the DPS site!
It was a pleasure to answer questions for Mary Andrade's feature on -
'Tips for Texturing Photographs' over on the DPS site.
For all newcomers to to Flypaper, simply mouse-over the images for a fast before/after effect!

Another dawn beach shot from Eastbourne on the English Channel coast. Taken with a Lensbaby Compositor with the aperture fully open.
The great thing about retro lens effects is the way they add a soft antique look when photographing subjects from another age,
in this case the ageless wave breakers. Without the lensbaby's softened edges this image would be quite different, almost abstract.
I could have left the image a darkly moody one, but chose instead to try and make it a little more painterly by using textures from the new flypaper spring painterly set.

Orange Blossom
- Overlay @ 54%
Umbra Eclipse - Overly @ 100% brushed away from bottom half
Opal - Soft Light @ 100% brushed away from top half
Newt - Color @ 19%

Afterwords the flattened imaged was brightened with the CS5 Adjustments - Levels.
The end result, I think you'll agree, is like turning the light on! :-)

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