Playing with the best bird photo I ever took

Texture Tuesday--I'll Fly Away

 

Probably the best bird photo I have ever taken. I just love the defiant stance in those little legs!

 

Kim's textures Unleashed and Evolve 2.

Three Muses--Timepiece

It's all relative, isn't it?

 

 

Some elements from Midnight Reverie kit from Deviant Scrap, textures from Elizabeth Golden.  The clock in Cleveland Circle is my photo, and, would you believe, the woman in the corner is a young Joan Crawford!

Crazy Amigos--Halloween

Maybe the last chance for Halloween art this year~

 

Made with PS brushes.

Collage Obsession--Dreams

 

We all have dreams we wish to pursue...life often gets in the way of this, so it's very important to keep your dream alive until you get the chance to make them a reality.

 

Model from DeviantArt stock images, background a collage of dictionary pages, painted with watercolor stroke brushes.

Take a Word--Wings

 

This started out as Icarus, and in the process of creation,slowly turned into Lucifer, the Morningstar, the brightest Angel in Heaven, who fell  in flames because of the sin of pride.

The dancer image is from Google, the wings are a brush with a Fire layer style applied.

(I love layer styles!)

The background is made with bits from JoesSistah, Spektoral Addendum and Blue Turban,

all found on Textures for Layers.

SPA--Halloween colors

This was so much fun!  I found the witch in a free kit from Trine Secher and then got to use a lot of my favorite PS brushes.

Inspired by Angi Sullins and Silas Toball

Some work inspired by these very originalFantasy artists.  Google them, they will make you smile and ooh and ah!  Or, here's a link totheir website: http://www.duirwaigh.com/

 

Three Muses--something wicked

 

Found this AWESOME wicked woman on Google

Playing with filters--into the light

Playing with Gaussian and Motiion Blur...and of course, with ghosts.

Mandarin Orange Monday--Faces

 

original photo

Taken in Forest Hills Cemetery, a piece of sculpture, rusted metal.

I played with Glowing Edges, gradient maps and blending modes and came out with this.

 

 

SPA--Retro Halloween

The image is a retro Halloween pin-up,  FGradient map, Haloween Elegante brushes and a few textures from Textures for Layers flickr group.  The postage stamp and Post Card brush are my own.

Soartful--Harvest Moon

Image found on Wikipedia, painted in PSE, cloud and scarecrow brushes applied. Text layer added, and a Black Magic texture from Jerry Jones applied.

Photo Art Friday--Autumn in the Graveyard

I used several layers of Bonnie's texture, Leafy Landscape, with different filters and blending modes applied to each.  The photo is of a very old burying ground in West Roxbury, where I live.  The final steps were to use some text brushes on the gravestones and some grunge brushes, both with color and as erasers to add some more overall texture.  I love how the overhanging foliage looks kind of ghostly.

some owls

Just for a hoot...

At Forest Hills Cemetery

Forest Hills is a wonderful, very old, cemetery in Boston.  It's a beautiful, peaceful place with century old trees, thousands of graves and mausoleums and some of the most incredibly beautiful funerary art in America.  Mostly from the victorian era, there are bronze statues, stone monuments and some wonderful contemporary sculpture installations.  This is a photo of one of the monuments, altered with gradients and blending modes.

 

This is a photo of a sugar maple at Forest Hills.  I applied the Orton effect.

 

 

Three Muses--Vintage

The woman is a Zeigfeld girl, the frame is from Fuzzimo. The flourish is from Dover and the rest from Marta Van Eck's Midnight Reverie kit

Collage Obsession--Witch

Exploring with Your Camera-Process of Elimination

This mon's topic for Ecploring With Your Camera is "process of elimination"--the paring down of the distracting elements in the photo frame to make a so-so shot into a "photograph".  Ideally this should be done with the camers itself, and not in post processing.  I recently found myself doing just this as I tooh dome photos of a neighbor's grape arbor.  This arbor is also home to a climbing rose. is chock-s-block with a hydrangea tree andthe ground is planted heavilt with coneflowers, bkack eyes Susans and other flowers.

A so-so photo of the grapes, lacking a focal point.

Second try--better focal point, but still too busy.

 

Final photograph--focus on the subject, background reduced to a blur.

 

Moo-Mania--Halloween

Images from The Sum of All Crafts, Graphics Fairy and Halloween brushes by rjanderson and Stephanie Shimerda

Take a Word--Poster

City Autumn

Found this photo on Morguefile and thought it would be a good candidate for the watercolor painting technique I've been exploring.  I like the way it turned out.

Mandarin Orange Monday--Brick Wall

I did not take this photo--it's from Morguefile--but I have taken several like it.  The orangeness appealed to me. Messed around with edges, levels, blurring and paintstrokes, then added the fern.

SPA--Ravens

 

Couldn't decide, so you get both...I LOVE Halloween!

Mandarin Orange Monday--Bengal

 

I have no idea how this came to be this...I think I was on autopilot

 

 

 

SPA--by the light of the moon

 

Here is my postcard foe this week's challenge.  It's a great Halloween theme!

I had fun with  this one.

Background from Marta Van Eck, moon overlay fron Trina Secher, ghost and tree brushes from Wyckedbrush@deviantart.com

The text brush is a manuscript by the poet, Rimbaud and the house is from my stash.

Take a word--Balloons

Sometimes it's all about letting go...

 

elements and papers fron the Midnight Reveries kits

More from the Night Circus

 

All these bits came from the kits in the Midnight Reverie Collaborative at Deviant Scrap

Autumn colors

Just playing with my old photos and PSE

a sad day...

My mom passed away early this morning.  We had been there earlier in the evening, and my father and sister were with her.
I am told that she opened her eyes, looked at my father and smiled...and then left us.

My Mom and Dad last May

 

Inspired by "The Night Circus"

Which I haven't even read yet, though I have reserved it at the library. 

I went on a shopping spree at Deviant Scrap buying fabulous kits by Marta Van Eck, Rucola Designs and Pink Lotty, along with a free add-on kit featuring the work of other designers.

All these pieces were made for the most part with elemenrts and papers from these kits.

Three Muses--Favorite Quote

This is one of my favorite quotes and has been in my mind a lot lately, as I and my family members prepare ourselves and each other for my mother's death.  It will be soon...

 

Elements and papers from Tumblefish Studios, Marta Van Eck, Beth Rimmer and Rucola Designs, all found at Deviant Scrap.

Mandarin Orange Monday--Marigolds

 

My favorite flower.

 

Edited using smart blur and glowing edges filters in a watercolor technique.