PHOTO ART: Mini-Challenge #07

Here’s another “mini-challenge” to play with in the Photo-based Art category.

Unlike “official challenges” for this forum which can be found here (http://www.retouchpro.com/challenge/index.html), this one will be self-contained within this thread. It is intended as an opportunity to engage in this artform until the next official challenge is posted.

The rules are more-or-less the same:
* It’s a challenge, not a contest -- intended to provide opportunities to experiment, share methods and/or techniques.
* Everyone who participates is a winner.
* There’s no expiration date.

- - - - - - - - - - -

#7 – The birthday present

A good friend of mine, whom I've known since high school, will be turning 50 soon. I thought it might be fun to have some of you artsy-crafty folks convert this relatively recent photo of him into "something arty." I'll take whatever entries are submitted and turn them into a special, one of a kind collage. Talk about a unique gift, huh? (Tentative title: "Here's Lookin' at You, Kid"!)

I'll need some "funny ones" as well as some "serious ones," so let your creativity flow.

Tom: If you want to do one where his eyeballs pop in and out or steam comes out his ears or whatever, I'll be sure to e-mail him the animated version. He'd NEVER get anything like that from Hallmark.com!

------------------
His birthday is August 8.

Entries submitted after August 3 (of any year) will be preserved and sent for his NEXT birthday.

Wow. Talk about the gift that keeps on giving! (and the mini-challenge that keeps on going)
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Guidelines:
1. Use any method, application(s), style(s) you like:
. * Convert to sketch, grayscale, abstract, watercolor, oil painting, pen-and-ink, Conte crayon, impasto, van Gogh or any style of your choosing
. * Add elements from other images (collage)
. * Wanna add animation? Go for it. (rolling eyeballs? disappearing/reappearing Graucho glasses?)
. * Hand painting? Tracing? Freehand? You bet. Always appreciate entries of this nature.
. * Apply filters from your favorite application(s)
. * Tweek it with 3rd party plug-ins

Bottom line:
How you create this masterpiece makes no difference. Whatever floats your boat as long as you follow guideline #4 in the process.

2. When done, reply to this thread and attach your work (don’t forget the 100kb size limit).

Note: Multiple entries OK if you’re so inspired.

3. By all means include some verbiage on how you achieved your masterpiece so others will benefit from your skills and experience. Make it as descriptive as you like. Grammar and spelling will not be graded. Priority given to content, not how it is written.

4. Have fun.

- - - - - - - - - - - - -

The checkered flag has dropped...

Permission to have FUN! has been granted.

It's up to you.

~DannyR~

Saved it as a GIF because it changed it in what I thought was a nice way. Happy Birthday!
:wavey:

On our birthdays, we think of the years past, so I took him back a few years -- usual History Brush after a severe Dust/Scratches softening, cloned away his long hair (his parent's wouldn't let him wear it long when he was a kid), added some hair (he went thru a "permed" phase -- I do lousy hair... ). Then I ran it thru the Ink Outlines filter and backed it off a bit.

Happy Birthday!

What a WONDERFUL wakeup surprise!

PHIL:
Your handiwork will fit right in with his "Haight-Ashbury" phase. He probably still has his 'original' lava lamp. Perfect. :)

CJ:
You're so right. His parents did object to the longer hair. A few years later he in fact tried the "perm thing" when Disco was the rage. I can still picture him wearing that tan polyesther leisure suit jabbing into the sky, John Travolta style, to the beat of a Donna Summers tune. I think he was even dancing with a girl at the time! (Dare I admit I even know about these things?)

Great work. Great gifts. He's gonna bust up when he sees these. Keep 'em coming.

~Danny~

I can still picture him wearing that tan polyesther leisure suit jabbing into the sky, John Travolta style

Okay, Danny -- Now what were YOU wearing? Just in case one of us tries to give your buddy a composite photo of him and you...:D

Here's my best shot of him in oils :)

Ok - well this one was pretty easy. I used an action called Paint on Canvas and that was that. I can't wait to work on the funny one!

Lisa

What every little boy wants for his birthday.

Throw back from the 60's.

Lisa

Dunno what it is exactly. And I fiddled around with it so much I lost track of how I did it. But here it is... :D

I know it involved Paint Engine a couple of times, smart blur, difference blending mode, gaussian blur, and a whole slew of layers...

I hope your friend has a GREAT birthday, Danny!

Here's my attempt. His birthday is the day before mine so I had to do something.

Jak, nice job on the mini-challenge "birthday boy.'' Looks very macho...he will LOVE it!

Phyllis

Ooooo-eeeeee, way to go Sanda! Good job! I love it.... :cool:

(And thanks, Phyllis. I had an awful lot of fun with this one...!)

Sanda! What a great job. I love it. Tell us how you did it!!!

Lisa

How did I do it? Well the first step was to find a leather jacket and resize it to fit and with a little skewing and distorting I was able to get it to look ok. Next was the bandanna, I found a site selling bandannas and "bowwowed" a bandanna to use a base. I resized it to fit the shape of our birthday boy's head. Then I thought it needed more so I "borrowed" the eagle, resized and distored him to fit.I found some sunglasses that looked a bit "biker" so I resized and distored them but there wasn't a visible left arm on the glasses I found so I had to build that from scratch. SO with a little drawing and playing I got something which looks a bit like the arm of the glasses. He needed an earring to complete the job so I found a picture of a gold cross pendant in my family photos and with a little skewing, distorting and playing around I got it to fit on his ear. And that's about all I did. It took about and hour and a bit including looking for all of the elements. I was going to give him a mohawke haircut but the biker look won out.

the biker look won out.

Good job, Sandra - and he makes a great looking biker!

Sorry I couldnt dedicate more time to this, but heres my contribution to the cause, for the man who has everything;)

Great idea Mike! I love it!

Oh that IS cool. I love it.

A little Warping...a little paint....and his true character comes out...:D
tom
:oldman:
Sanda...The Fonz would love it.

Jak...great paint job

Oh girl...What no love beads?

Doug...Playboy fits in with Hef etal.

Woody...Sony Bono???

CJ...Is that Robert reed???

Black kgt...A coalminers daugeters dad???

Mike...love your manipulation.
.

CJ...Is that Robert Reed??? -- Tom

Tom, it does look like "Mr. Brady's" hair, doesn't it. :D

I hope your version is true ONLY for his birthday... :)

You guys are killin’ me! These are hysterical. I’m gone for a day and you’re going bonkers in the ol’ sandbox.

It’s like everbody got into the catnip at once. It’s wondeful!

~~~~~~~~~

Woody:
You’ve captured how he looked one night or maybe it was the morning after the two of us drank way-too-many margaritas. Doing him "in oils" was right on, cuz we got pretty "oiled" that time. (Actually soon after this relatively current picture was taken, he got a lot of his hair cut, trying to do the “spikey (hair)do” look.) An inspired version. He’ll like this one for sure.

Tom:
How did you know one of his favorite sayings years ago when Flip Wilson was the rage was, “The Devil made me Do It!”? He frequently claimed to be able to "swat flies" with his tongue. This just proves he was right -- well maybe more like "torch flies." What a riot.

Thank you, Lisa…
For helping balance out the collection. It’s a wonderful companion to “The Hippie” version. The theme on #2 is perfect, since he actually attended the original “Woodstock.” One of his favorite songs was (and still is) Steppenwolf's rendition of "Born to be Wiiiiiii-iiii-lll-d." Unfortunately he still plays it on his RECORD PLAYER (no kidding). Very glad to see your work again.

Doug! Doug! Doug!
“What every little boy wants for his birthday?” That would be a glass of apple juice in one hand and a photo-op with, Hef, right? :) I'm sure he had at least a damp dreams about this senerio (less Hugh, most likely). Now there's proof. Ingenius.

Jak:
Yours is reminiscennt of how he looked at night in those crowded disco lounges, looking for love in obviously (now) all the wrong places. A very stylish rendition, indeed!

EXCELLENT sunglasses, earring and leather jacket, Sanda!
This is funny. When he graduated from high school his dad got him a Honda-90 motorbike. It wasn’t even a motorCYCLE… barely got up to 30 miles per hour! I’m sure he WISHED he could have looked this cool. Splendid job.

Mike…this is the ultimate compliment.
Being “carved” in stone could hardly be more appropriate. Among some of his workmates these days (all of whom are 20-30 years younger than he is), he’s referred to as “Ol’ Granite A$$.” A very unique and clever rendition.

And, CJ...
For the record I'll never ever ADMIT to having worn a leisure suit. ;) At this point I'm gonna put my plans for submitting a picture of the two us to this crew for creative interpretation on permanent hold! LOL. Can you blame me?

~~~~~~~~

I can tell you now that before I posted this mini-challenge I gave fleeting thought of posting a picture of myself. I think…no, I KNOW -- that I’m glad you’re experimenting on my buddy first. TG my birthday isn’t until February!

This just keeps getting better and better -- and just think I can take entries until August 3. The prospects are mind boggling.

I can't thank you enough.

~Danny~

~~~~~~~~~~~

Here's a desaturated original on which Colored Pencil was applied (paper brightness about 40), topped with a multiplied version of itself, topped with a copy of the color BG layer set to Color, merge 'em all together and run PE using Vikki's custom 0Wetter and Voilat! Kind of a colored chalk effect.

Here is my entry, hope I'm not too late.

Oh yeah, my 2 cents. I like Sandra's best.

Yes there have been some great entries for this so far. Is it just me or does the Hippy have a little of Gene Hackman in him?:D

Tom, that devil one is great, although it scares the pants off me;)

Ok, better late than never... :) Here's my entry. Just a bit of a water color effect and a PhotoImpact lighting effect for good measure.

Now that you mention it Mike - he does look like Gene Hackman! LOL

Lisa

Sandra. Great job on your biker version.

Sharon:)

Thanks for the fun challenge, Danny!

I decided your friend should go south of the border for a birthday fiesta, so I gave him a sombrero and a serape that I made by liquefying Photoshop 7.0's built-in "blanket" pattern under "styles" (which also created the background along with the "chalk&charcoal" filter for roughness).

He looked way too "hometown Kansas City" though, so I used "distort-pinch" to exaggerate his smile (gotta be happy at your fiesta de cumpleanos, after all!) and to crinkle up his eyes for a caricature look. Then I used brightness and contrast to deepen and accent those sexy wrinkles, while brightening up his teeth and giving him a sunbaked complexion. Finally I clone-stamped his ponytail to give him macho sideburns. Esta un hombre muy guapo, no?

Phyllis

Hi Phyllis,

Wonderful job on your version. The colors are so bright and cheery.

Sharon:)

Hiya folks!

This is my first post ...... and I'm submitting my photo art for the 'Birthday Boy' challenge.

This was fun ..... and I look forward to many more!

I duplicated the original layer, and left the original on the bottom, while giving the top picture several effects, such as poster edges and sharpen. I then extracted the man from the background using my new Wacon tablet. :-) I LOVE IT!!

I made a 3'rd layer, which I made a deep blue and then used Render>Clouds. EDITED: OOPS! Sorry ..... decided against the cloud background ... and replaced with a color from his hair. I then added a small bit of > Noise, and then >Brush Strokes > Angled Strokes. There .. that's better! :-)

I made a 4th layer for my signature... a good artist always signs their work. 'wink'

OH by the way Danny ...... is this hunk single? LOL!! Just joking!

Glad to be here ..... and nice to meet you all ..... hope to get to know you all better.

Hugs,
dd

Welcome DD! Great first entry. Look forward to seeing more. Thanks for the great description.

Lisa

welcome aboard, theres no better way to get aquainted with us here, than diving right into a challenge - good start as well:) nice description and nice effect

Hi Lisa!

Nice to meet you too ...... thanks for the welcome! :-)

I'll be introducing myself in another post later on ..... so you can know me better.

This is a great place!

Hugs,
dd

Hiya Mike!

Thanks so much for the compliment on my work. :-)

Nice to meet you also .....

Hugs,
dd

Hi again folks!

OK ..... here's my 2'nd entry of birthday boy...... this is much more of a eerie effect. :-)

Enjoy!

Hugs,
dd

:)
I'm really having fun viewing the entries on this one:) Here's my small contribution. First I painted the photo in Painter Classic, then opened in Photoshop, applied, filter, sketch, Photocopy. I simplified the lines by painting over some of them or part of them. I then opened in Painter Classic again and with a paint brush put in shading. Photoshop, applied a very low diffuse glow. i thought he looked like the out doors type, so I put him on a background I had on file of trees and stream. Wonderful bone structure!!!:)

Wanda

Wanda - I love it! He does look outdoorsy, and that's a wonderful bkground.

Here's what he looks like in stained glass

:bawling:

CJ gets my vote. She made our bithrday boy 20 years younger. Sandra definitely defined his generation.
Here's my contribution. In his youth he must have had his bedroom full of posters that glow int he dark.
So here's your poster birthday boy.
Tony

This one is a little different.
Hmmm. No attachment. I'll try again.

wow there are so many great entries in this mini challenge. Every time a new one gets posted I sit here in awe of the talent in this forum. You're all so good. well done everyone. :bigthmb:

Sorry gland, I don't know what happened when I first uploaded my picture. I think it's better now.

For entry#2 thought I'd be serious...no moving parts...
just emboss effect.
tom
:oldman:

Wanda ...love the effect looks like amarker drawing

Angie....popart...A OK

Sorry no way to attach in edit that I can see...will repost

Originally posted by angue
Sorry gland, I don't know what happened when I first uploaded my picture. I think it's better now.

Sorry about the confusion. I was trying to upload one of mine. :)

I still don't have it figured out.

My orig was over limit

2nd entry try

tom

hello? did someone see my retinas? Angue?:D hehe nice if bright pressie:)

tom c - This is terrific. Looks like the head side of a coin. A short description of how you did it would be helpful.

3rd entry
tom

"Emboss" effect in #2 effect and
This one is a task type That I d/l from a Photoimpact user Called Gandys favorite task and it installs in a Quick command panel.
The steps on how he arrived at this are unknown to me.

Tom says of his entry 3 for birthday boy:

<<"Emboss" effect in #2 effect and
This one is a task type That I d/l from a Photoimpact user Called Gandys favorite task and it installs in a Quick command panel.
The steps on how he arrived at this are unknown to me.>>

You know what would be neat? Make it round and raise the edges and maek it copper-colored to look like a penny! You can get metallic effects with embossed pictures rather easily. I couldn't say just how without doing it again, but I've done it in the past and know it can be done without Kai's power tools or any presets...just working with contrast and hue/saturation will do it very effectively.

Maybe I will give it a try if you wouldn't mind...

But then again, it's late and I never get to bed any more due to all the really awesome stuff on this site! It's kept me up till dawn on a few nights, I hate to admit. Is there another site for a support group for those of us who want to break our addiction to "retouchpro?"

Phyllis :)

Wanda,

I really loved your sketch of birthday boy. What a unique effect! Sounds a bit too involved for me to try unfortunately...you must be an artist, right?

Phyllis :)

:)

CJ, thank you, I'm glad you like it:) Oh yeah, that's right you like the rugged type;)

Wanda

:)

Tom C, thank you:) And thank you for your entries, your animations are wonderful. I must say the duck and the bridge is my favorite:D The look on the duck's face when the bridge starts to fall is hilarious! Keep them coming:cool:

Wanda

:)

Phyllis, thank you, I'm glad you like my rendition of birthday boy:) It really wasn't that difficult, it just sounds involved, if I can do it anyone can:) THanx!!!

Wanda

See above info re: how
tom c

For some reason, I can't seem to get the attachment feature to work so here is a link to my entry.
http://customcabinets.com/CG/birthdayboy07.jpg

gland-- wonderful entry! I'm sure the "birthday boy" will love it!

Good compositing work.

No one commented on what I thought should have been commented on, so I will! I thought your alien one with the pointy ears was just great!! What did you use in the background?
:wavey:

hehe, they just keep rolling in:D love the astronaut one. Also I love the muchacho entry.

HEY ...... thanks Blacknight ........ I was thinking nobody could see my second entry ..... there was no comment on it. :-(

Actually ....... on a separate layer .... I made small 'bubbles' by bringing the transparency way down ..... and adding a small white 'spot' on them to give the look of of light.

Thank for looking! :-)

Hugs,
dd

Hi DD,
great entries, I particularly like the sketch, it's wonderful. The "mr Spock" one is very good too, Love the ears. :-)Sorry I didn't comment earlier but I've been in awe of all the great entries in this challenge.

This has turned into quite a thread. I really like gland's astronaught. coooooooooooool.
greg

dd50stripes alien looks a little like Larry Bird.
Very effective.

:)

Gland, I love what you did with birthday boy:) I have to say it looks legitimate, really great work!! And they say photos don't lie:D

Wanda

:)
Sanda, you did a fantastic job. Excellent manipulation, looks real to me:) I bet he's going to love it:cool:

Wanda

wow there are so many great entries in this mini challenge. Every time a new one gets posted I sit here in awe of the talent in this forum. You're all so good. well done everyone. :bigthmb: - Sanda.
A great BIG ditto to that one. Simply amazing!

Phyllis:
"South of the border" is very, very inspired. The colors of the serape (sp?) really set it off. Birthday Guy's made more than a couple trips to Mexico and I know Mexican food is among his favorites. Chips, salsa and margaritas , anyone? Ole!:)

DD:
Welcome to RetouchPRO! It's an honor to have your first two entries posted not only in this forum, but in this thread! You're not only talented (#1 is especially nice), I can see you've got a sense of humor, too. #2 is just a riot. Birthday Guy is still a Star Trek fan and I know he'll get a real yuck out of the ears!

Wanda:
The earthtones and outdoorsy background make an inspired combination. It's always a pleasure to see your inspiring efforts!

Woody:
The stained glass effect is among my favorites. I'm sure Birthday Boy will prefer this interpretation over one in which he's depicted, say, behind bars! Glad to see you've caught a full dose of FUN SPIRIT!

Angue:
Welcome to RP, too! This is a awesome version among the pop-art themed entries. "Where's the black light?" Andy Worhol would be pleased, as I'm sure BB will be, too. Again, welcome, and thanks for jumping right in the pool with the rest of the crazies, here!

Tom:
A double dose of seriously cool. I especially like #3... kind of an inverted salt-and-peppery effect.

Gary:
Whoa! "One giant LEAP for this thread!" Hope it's just a temp. glitch. This effort is EXCEPTIONAL!

Note: Though I was able to resolve the link to your site earlier, I'm not able to at the moment.

----------------
I repeat the essence of the intro quote again: Wow!

Just terrific gang...and still several days to go until I'll be piecing these together.

Can it get any more creative than this?
=========
IMPORTANT!

I'm going to be off-line until Sunday, 8/3, so don't think you're being ignored in the mean time. Catching a little R&R time with the family. Keep having fun until then...

Eya next week.

~Danny~

This IS a great mini challenge. I'd like to thank everyone for their kind comments.:)

If I had to vote for just one it would be Sandra's Biker birthdayboy. That one is just awesome.

I just wanted to thank everyone for their warm welcome. :)

Sanda: no problem not commenting .... I just wasn't sure it was showing up. I know there are so many great entries it's hard to keep track. LOL!! I wasn't thinking of Spock when I did the 'alien' entry ... just a far-out make-up effect.

Fugitive: thanks for the comments. :) Larry Bird? Hmm?? That's a famous basketball player .. right? LOL!! Shows how much I keep up on sports!!

Danny: Thank you so much for the welcome! :) It's funny, cause I wasn't really thinking of Star Trek or Spock at all when I was creating the 2'nd entry ...... just an alien effect. But hey, he's a fan .... and that's cool ..... a coincidence! VERY nice forum here ..... keep up the good work. ;)

To All: So many wonderful entries and effects! I like them all for different reasons ....... I'm so glad to have found this place! :)

Hugs,
dd

Entry #2. Feel like 20 bucks?

Looking into a funhouse mirror!:tongue:

Thanks everybody for the kind comments about my biker version of this mini challenge. I was a lot of fun and quite easy. Hope the birthday boy enjoys all the wonderful versions of his photo. He'd be mad if he didn't. :D

Hello everyone. I am new to this site, I really enjoy the challenges and such, it gives me a chance to practice my skills. I came across this thread and love everyones efforts. Thought I'd jump in with an entry. This is my first attachment, so let me know what you think and I'll follow up with what steps I took to get there. Thanks!

hehe Woody I cant remember the last time I looked into a funhouse mirror - nice concept:)

i really like the business suit idea, and the duotone(?) is very effective, really cant tell its not the original:)

des - really good job, and an interesting direction to take our biker/astronaut/hippie/mariachi -- right back into the button-down work world. :)

Thanks for the comments. I loved all the wacky depictions but I figured I would try something that seemed almost opposite his personality.
Here's what I did. Found an image of a man wearing suit, then using photoshop erased unwanted elements and sized suit to fit our portrait. I used the clone stamp to touch up background and remove longer hair. Also used clone stamp to remove mustache and clone bottom lip to create thin upper one. Then used the healing brush to add some texture back into this area, and also to soften just a couple eye wrinkles. I used the paintbrush to whiten teeth a bit, and fussed with lip line and mouth edges. I flattened the image, then used channel mixer to make it black and white. Settings were monochromatic box checked, red +80, blue +14. I increased the overall contrast by +10. Then duplicated the layer. On the copy layer I applied a tiny gaussian blur to soften just a bit, then went to hue/saturation and colorized image with a bit of sepia toning, and also reduced brightness by about 10. Then I set this layer to overlay mode at 40 percent opacity. I thought it gave a nice look to the suit persona, allthough I really like some of the brightly done portraits!

thanks for the explanation - amost as valuable as your art contribution:)

Des
that's quite a makeover ..he wont recognize himself....:D

nice work
tom c
:oldman:

Gland, great job on your astronaut picture. Good idea and nicely executed.

Phyllis

I'm not sure what got into me dragging up this old thread. For some reason, I felt compelled to try making this into a characture sketch like a carnival artist might do. Partially successful maybe?

Distort tool on several selections then some filters:
Accented Edges
Smudge Stick
Sketch:Charcoal on a duplicate & masking the man's face.

-Mark

Lot's of stuff; usual filters that I always seem to use (Paint Engine, Impressionist, etc.). Also used GIMPressionist Canvas preset to add additional texture and, in the begining of the rendering, I Overlayed a Toadies metalwork filter. :)

lkroll,
good one! now he looks even more cheerful and relaxed... and very nice background you have here :)

I'm still trying to get that oil on canvas look; still need to do some fine-tuning on this simulation. :)

Ikroll, your work is definitely is becoming more painterly. I am looking into Gimp.

Cathy :wavey:

Impressionist (http://www.trimoon.com/html/downloads.html) and Paint Engine (http://home.centurytel.net/luvs2cr8/paintengine.html) do not run in GIMP unfortunately. :)

Tomorrow i shall work on a proper picture, but this is what happens if you go to a drunken plastic surgeon, tell your friend not to go ask for a eyelift, or his lips botoxed, Oh i reduced his hairline too, helps that for when the old guy starts to recede!

Seems though hes got abit of a trembling lip, i think the knife slipped, hes now a woman!

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/elleuk/gottleofbeer.gif

Legacy, that's hilarious! :lmao:

legacy,

you're getting as bad as me ;) quite funny :)

Craig

Thank you, yes Craig its rubbing off!

I know it was first posted in 2002, but its not that late to wish Happy Birthday is it?

For a present you could Google plastic surgery. :rolleyes:

Peter