A Little Bit of NZ

[therookie]

Originally Posted by leanan`si

Some photos taken a few weeks ago on a morning's walk into the bush, then along a black sand beach called Bethel's Beach. The beach features huge sand dunes which are regularly used for All BLack's training. Not an All BLack in sight though the morning I went there.

Hope you enjoy and can find something to inspire the artist in you

leanan`si

very beautiful pics! I had the good fortune of living in your country for almost a year. Getting on the plane to head back to the us of a was on of the hardest things i ever did! looking forward to seeing more pics.

[leanan`si]

I'm blessed to be so close to some very beautiful places. How sad you had to leave.

*whispers to palms*
I have snuck a couple of pieces of photo art into threads, just not this one

I didn't get to see the beefcakes in training, but I did manage to go to a very lovely park with a lake today. All the young birds are hatching around the lakesaide. I'm wondering how Steve likes swans and geese and ducks, not to mention, the Australian Coot!

leanan

[Janet Petty]

Originally Posted by leanan`si

I'm wondering how Steve likes swans and geese and ducks, not to mention, the Australian Coot!

leanan

If he doesn't, I do.

Janet

[Swampy]

Loved the pampas grass shot! Had to have a play with it.

First desaturated the sky to a softer blue

Then I selected the tops of the stalks, put them on their own layer and used an action that reduces JPEG artifacts (I ran this action 4 or 5 times) and then a 4 pixel gaussian blur. Although artifacting was not a great problem in this photo, the effect of the action reduced color and smeared the selection giving a fluffy effect similar to smudge painting.

Reversed the selection and ran the Spatter filter on the background.

[leanan`si]

I've been gazing at your picture realising that I was waiting for something fluffy to drift across it. The texture is gorgeous.

Janet, the themes seem to have drifted into animals of various types ... I have a cygnet, a pukeko and maybe an ant on a daffodil (or a daffodil with an ant). I'll post them sometime during the week.

I've been playing with a new (old) camera and many of the shots were of birds proving that they were quicker than I, but I did manage to get a few.

*laughs* maybe I should post a few duds and see what can be done!

leanan

[Swampy]

Thank you Leanan. I forgot to mention that I ran that JPEG reducer a several times (maybe 4 or 5) to get the smeary effect. I'll go back and edit my post to reflect that.

[lkroll]

I added a little bit of Eye Candy glass set to soft light to wetten it a bit. I've attached a very low quality (22%) crop for those on dialup. Here's the link to the full high quality version (869K).

[leanan`si]

with the pompous toitoi. But I'm not sure that I can remember quite what I did. My brain and concentration are in a flu induced haze.

But I remember playing with Impressions then reducing the effects by quite a lot, enough to retain flicky little white bits around the flowers of the toitoi, then ummm ..dry brush and increased the colours-contrasts. I think I may have left a little crosshatch in there and added some noise. Ahhh .. and Virtual Photographer's Glamour filter just after the Impressionist.

leanan

[pavel123]

Leanan,

Very nice picture...


Pavel

[lkroll]

Originally Posted by leanan`si

with the pompous toitoi. But I'm not sure that I can remember quite what I did. My brain and concentration are in a flu induced haze.

But I remember playing with Impressions then reducing the effects by quite a lot, enough to retain flicky little white bits around the flowers of the toitoi, then ummm ..dry brush and increased the colours-contrasts. I think I may have left a little crosshatch in there and added some noise. Ahhh .. and Virtual Photographer's Glamour filter just after the Impressionist.

leanan

Wow Leanan; very nice and well done. What Impressionist preset did you use?

[leanan`si]

It's 3.50 am, and here I am trying to figure out why on earth I cannot get anything bar the default charcoal style. I've been trying to load a couple of style sets gleaned from Danny's thread on Impressionist style .. how to install and use. And despite following instructions to the letter, nothing happens. I can access no more styles other than charcoal

So that's what it was .. perhaps it was fortunate!

leanan, who thanks you kindly

[pavel123]

Originally Posted by leanan`si

It's 3.50 am, and here I am trying to figure out why on earth I cannot get anything bar the default charcoal style. I've been trying to load a couple of style sets gleaned from Danny's thread on Impressionist style .. how to install and use. And despite following instructions to the letter, nothing happens. I can access no more styles other than charcoal

So that's what it was .. perhaps it was fortunate!

leanan, who thanks you kindly

There's a thread on RP dealing with troubleshooting of the IMP plug-in.
http://www.retouchpro.com/forums/sho...roubleshooting

The plug-in is very sensitive to being set up in the right way in terms of the folder structure. Plug in itself should be in Plug-Ins PS folder (Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop CS2\Plug-Ins\) directory, while the rest of the files should be in subdirectory called "Impressionist Accessories". (C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop CS2\Plug-Ins\Impressionist Accessories).

The best way to deal with a moody IMP is to physically delete everything and to re-install it again (a copy can be downloaded from trimoos's site).

Pavel

[alexmeta]

leanan`si wonderful photos and all artsy editions
I liked the middle one, and made it with Impressionist

Regards
Alex