[jeaniesa]

Wanda - I love it! Especially how you darkened the butterflies to give a feeling of depth. Very, very cool!

Jeanie

[Wanda Schwind]

Jeanie, thanks This is really enjoyabe, believe it or not it's very educational, I've tried things I've never tried before I'm really glad you like it

Wanda

[Wanda Schwind]

Doug, I REALLY like your butterfly It would make very pretty stationery. But, who uses stationery anymore, it makes me want to though

Wanda

[Brandee]

I couldn't resist this one... here's what I came up with:

http://paragoneffect.com/portfolio/r...watercolor.jpg

I'll save ya from my usual description of 5000 words-- basically I used a combination of the art history brushes to create a "watercolor" effect. Then I created the "paper" on a new layer with good ol' Render> Clouds and Render> Difference Clouds... embossed it slightly for texture and set the layer mode to hard light. I duplicated the paper layer and set it to multiply, erased some of the areas around the butterfly and called it a night. (:

These are fun and I hope to get around to trying some more!

[DannyRaphael]

Brandee:

When I first saw your pic the three words I said out loud in a breathy exhale were: "Whoa! How cool!" The dreamy butterfly on the delicate paper is just a wonderful combination.

What a great way to start my day at 4:30 a.m.

After you get a couple hours of shuteye, would you do me two little favors:
* Add another post to this thread and attach a copy of your image. That way your creation will be preserved here at RetouchPRO "forever" for folks to enjoy (hopefully) years in the future.
* And while you're at it, do tell us more about the technique you used to get such a great watercolor effect via Art History Brush. I've not seen anything this good watercolor-wise from AHB before.

Really look forward to seeing more of your magic. Glad you're having fun. Have as much as you like!

~DannyR~

[Wanda Schwind]

Brandee, this is awesome, just beautiful As my son would say it ROCKS!!! I also would like to know a little more about this technique. Thanks, for sharing this wonderful piece of art with us

Wanda

[Brandee]

Thank you VERY much for the kind words... glad ya liked it. (: As for the art history brush, here's a bit more detail on how I went about doing it (mostly from my memory, so sorry if I forget anything!):

Before I started, I cropped the image and changed the canvas size so I had a big white border around it. I wanted to have room for a soft, blended edge around the border of the photograph later.

1. Duplicated original layer and go to Filter> Noise> Median. This gave the image a slight blur-- comes in handy later on.

2. Duplicated the original layer and place it above the Median layer. Select the art history brush and used a light touch to "paint" areas of the butterfly and flowers. I chose the "chalk" brush (should be located in Photoshop's default brush set). I left the brush's blending mode to normal and changed the opacity to 12%, then I switched to "dab" style with 100% fidelity and an area of 2px. A tablet came in handy for varying the pressure a bit, but honestly it could have been done the same way with some patience and a mouse.

3. Copied the painted layer for safe keeping and hid it. On the painted layer that wasn't hidden, I used the eraser with a natural brush ("chalk" again) to erase and bring back some of the detail... especially around the wings and body of the butterfly. This is where the layer with the median blur came into play... it kept the exposed areas from my erasing from looking too photographic.

4. Pretty happy with the results now, I went back to the layer with the art history brush strokes. I wanted to soften the border around the image, so I selected the art history brush again and changed the opacity to 30%. Still using "dab" with the chalk brush, I "painted" around the border of the photo to give it a nice soft and uneven edge.

The paper was created as I said in my previous post, and there ya have it... a digital watercolor with the art history brush. (: I only really started to use the history brushes recently, but they are a lot of fun and give you a lot more control than the standard filters.

[DannyRaphael]

Brandee:

A+ Sellar image. Stellar writeup. To add to what Wanda's a-lot-hipper-than-me son would say, "This Rocks - BIG TIME!"

Many thanks not only for today, but for years to come!

~DannyR~

[tom c]

checked out all the butterflies and all great images...


Danny i know the object here is to create a picture effect from a photo..

hope you dont mind moving pictures

Just chopped up thebutterflys wings...transformed...and made 4 frames...had to make it smaller because of d/l time.
tom

[DannyRaphael]

Tom:

Nobody ever said "Photo Art" had to be static! This is GR-EAT!

My compliments for venturing (make that, FLYING) outside the sandbox. Well done!

You get a big A+ for maxing out the FUN METER on this one!

~Danny~

[Woody]

Basically, I just selected the butterfly, duped
it 4 times, transformed horizinally fliped 2, and
resized 2. Placed the butterflys on the scene,
then gausian blurred the background using
a 2.5 pixel setting. Flatten to .jpg.

[tom c]

That's a nice mob scene
Wonder what they call a bunch of butterflys...A flock???
tom

[Woody]

Well, after looking at everone elses work, I
decided to play around with Paint Shop Pro 7's Artistic
Effects and here's what I came up with. It
sort of reminds me of a blacklight scene
Settings for Colored Edges effect:
Luminance -98
Blur 9
Intensity 12
Color Aqua

I suppose a group of butterfly's would be
called a herd Tom, after all they are "butter"
flys

[tom c]

Oh that's a nice effect....sorta like evening ....pretty
tom

[T Paul]

Okay a quick delay to avoid my yard work....

Photoshop 7.0
Selected the butterfly onto its own layer, converted photo to grayscale, made the Polaroid frame on a separate layer, added drop shadows...and had lots of fun!


-T