Look Around

One of my new books on photography suggested taking pictures of the things that are right around you.  This photo is a section of one of the walls in our living room.  Here are some of the images I took.  Maybe you can pick them out in the larger picture?

These books are in the bookcase, but I turned them on their side in Photoshop.

These bottles are near a doll sitting on a rocking chair.

This one should be pretty easy to pick out!

Ditto.

This is a close-up detail from Serenity, the mixed media piece hanging over the fireplace.

This image is a part of the mountains in Serenity.  That's cheesecloth that I glued onto the canvas.  I love cheesecloth...

Lastly, a close-up of the cork in the base of the lamp on the left.

Happy Valentine's Day!

This is a quilt called "Hearts and Flowers" that I made in 2003.

Moon Set

Full moon was a couple nights ago.  It was cloudy that evening, but the next morning was clear and I thought I'd go to the beach to take shots of the setting moon.  When I reached the beach, I could tell that the moon was going to set on land, rather than in the water.  I drove back to the high rise bridge, parked at a restaurant, and walked onto the bridge to take my photos.

The 50 or so shots I took all looked pretty much like this one - lousy!  So, once more, Photoshop into the breach....

The auto levels feature gave an interesting blue picture.

For this image, I used the "cutout" filter.  It does give the look of paper cutouts assembled in a collage.

I may have used "soft light" on this one.  Then I used the filter called "lens flare" and centered the flare over the moon.  A bit on the dreamy side....

For this last image, I went to Hue/Saturation and altered the hue to get this purple effect. 

By the way, I looked up the definition for "into the breach":  to do work that someone else is not able or not willing to do.  I think that does a good job of summing up the relationship between my photographic efforts, and the help I get from Photoshop!

Man and Dog

I was playing in Photoshop today, experimenting with some different filters.  This one is called "Angled Strokes", and is under "Brush Strokes".  This is the first time I've tried "Angled Strokes" and really like the effect.

I'm not sure which filter(s) I used for this image, but my best guess is "Dry Brush," found under "Artistic."  Yes, really, I know I should write these things down....

This was a Texture filter called "Craquelure."  Please click on the images if you want to see them enlarged. 

With this image, I was working with three layers, and was experimenting with "Soft Light."

This isn't exactly the original photograph, but it seems to be the closest of those I have left!  The first image at the top is my favorite from the day's work.