hi kids :D

a balmy -21 celsius (yes, minus. that's -6 Fahrenheit) here in Montreal as I we speak. :cold:
Time for a mental vacation south. (it will have to do)

This lovely New Orleans courtyard looks mighty appealing. Imagine yourself sitting there, slathered in sun block, drinking whatever it is one imbibes for refreshment in N'allins.... your paints are out and you are capturing the mood..

have fun :hat:

The low in the morning here in Oklahome is predicted to be +12 F.
Maybe we should all take a mental vacation to warmer climes!:oldman:

1st attempt.
I wanted to try accentuating the light/shadow play here.

First think I did was boost up the shadows to pull some detail out.

bubba, I'll take +12 happily today ;)

ravenmd - there is a nice little table in the side courtyard under the overhanging Spanish Moss. The forum should meet there for brunch!

PhotoImpact - colored pen (wish I could do the same thing that easily in Photoshop)
PhotoShop - take PI image and add canvas texture

I won't be mean enough to tell you today's temperature in the Phoenix, Arizona area... :)


Brightened/lightened it up to look like an Arizona patio...

coloured pencil ! :D very effective bubba


thought I'd try giving the building a yellow paint job

O WOW CJ! It really does have an Arizona look to it now. Certainly is a warm toned picture. :d

I say we all meet there for brunch weekly.

Wonderful work everybody!!
Marie - you guys aren't doing much better than we are here, it's staying around - 25 C during the day and around -30 at night, plus over the past couple days we've had more snow than we've had all winter, it's crazy I kept having to shovel off our big lot every couple hours, but thankfully it's stopped for a while. Even though it's pain (literally, my back is killing from all the shovelling!!) it is really beautifull, there's over a foot of snow (and that's after it's already settled out somewhat..) on all of the ground and the trees have are covered with huge mounds of snow. if actually get some sun tomorrow, I'll go out and take some photo's with the cheap digital cam I just got to show you guys what it all looks like (but I won't promise much, it only shoots at 640 x 480 and the quality's not very good - I mostly got it to use as a web cam for online conversations with my friends etc.)

- David :)

CJ - love the Arizona patio - what did you change the Spanish Moss into for the pic?

revenmd - the yellow toned pic is beautiful

David - we can talk about cold but leave the snow out of it! I finished high school several decades ago in central Florida and they truned out school for 1/4" of snow! Most of the kids had never seen it!

turned out for a 1/4 inch of snow?!?!! :lol: oh man, around here there could be 3 feet of snow and the wouldn't close the schools.. actually, in my memory, I don't know of any time that the schools have closed down for a snow day here.

- David :)

CJ, love that soft sunny look! Raven, your second one looks almost like stained glass...lovely.

Like, CJ, I thought the shade made it look too cool, and with the subzero temps it's cool enough around here, so I am going to think summer.

Phyllis

David - when I lived in Puerto Rico I knew a girl that had never seen snow. Went to college Georgia Tech and an instructor had to turn out a class when it started to snow because she got so excited! I am suprised that you did not do a version with snow!

Phyllis - as always a great job

Raven -- after Phyllis pointed it out, I see how your 2nd one looks like a stained glass cell -- wouldn't that be a lovely stained window!

Found a couple pretty neat arty actions here:
http://www.digitalfocus.net/downloads.htm

This image is based on one of them (Watercolor portrait) + a little fine tuning afterwards, namely with a bit of blurring topped with plus a Smart Blur / Edge only inverted layer (based on the original image) softened with Diffuse > Anisotropic faded to about 70%. Hue/Saturation and levels.

Added "frame by Schwartzie" action.

Very nice image, Ravenmd. Reminded me of a trip to South Florida I took in the late 80s.

~Danny~

oh that's lovely Danny! I like the treatment of colours.

I went to the site you mentioned and got the actions.. testing them out now..

Danny - thanks for the action link

bubba

Bubba:

RE: Action link. You bet; glad to share.

- - - - - -

Ravenmd:

I was so inspired by the results you achieved on first entry (great colors and definition), I attempted to recreate them -- and then applied a few twists of my own.

* Duplicated original BG
* To the duplicate, applied Smart Blur / Edge Only; inverted results and set opacity to Soft Light
* Ran Diffuse / Anisotropic against the Edge layer to soften edges a bit
* Duplicated Edge layer and ran Sprayed strokes filter to give the edges a little texture; applied Unsharp Mask to enhance the effect
* Embossed, set blend mode to Overlay to apply the textured lines and achieve a little depth
* Added a layer filled with 50% and applied Texturizer/Sandstone filter; lowered opacity to 40% to let some of the texture through
* Hue/Sat and Levels adjustment layers to bring out colors and contrast
* Framed

Cheers!
~Danny~