[DannyRaphael]

A priceless candid taken by Lee of his daughter sharing a special moment with mom. Check out Lee's site at www.leebase.com.

Happy creating.

~Danny~

[DannyRaphael]

I'm taking a pass on the "How to" steps with this one as I was in complete experimental mode and not keeping track like I usually do. The original intent was to come with an interpretatation that resembled a watercolor look, but after about 15 experimental Impressionist-generated layers, it started looking less like WC and more like I don't know what.

But it was fun and definitely is different.

"Thanks, Lee, for letting me use your pic."

~Danny~

[kiska]

Looks like a really neat Pastel.
kiska

[kiska]

Here are two versions. Basically used Painter 8 and Feivel's glow.

[DannyRaphael]

Kiska:

Your crop is outstanding. It really showcases the subjects. I liked your idea so much, I used it on mine!

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Important Note The attachments (for some reason) are attaching out of order. The first one is the last one described, the middle one is the first one described and the one on the far right is the second one described.

I dunno why and I'm too tired to fight it!

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I was looking for a fairly easy effect for Impressionist beginners on this one. Don't be frightened by the number of steps. Each one is easy to do, but necessary.

1. Duplicate Background
2. Apply Impressionist Charcoal > Default
2a. (Almost forgot). Oversharpen this layer with Unsharp Mask. About 150, 16, 0 ought to do it. It will look strange, but stay with me.
3. Duplicate Background again and drag the duplicate to the top of the layer stack.
4. Apply Photoshop's Find Edges filter.
5. Change the blend mode to Darken and add a Layer Mask.
6. Turn off the Find Edges layer for the moment.
7. Duplicate Background again and drag the duplicate to the top of the layer stack.
8. Apply Photoshop's Dry Brush filter. I used 2,8,2 for settings.
9. Add a Hide All Layer Mask to this layer.
10. Choose the Brush tool, turn on the Airbrush option, set Flow to ~ 40%, Opacity ~ 40%.
11. Right-click while the cursor is anywhere over the image and select a soft-edged brush and with the master diameter slider at the top of the dialog, set the radius to ~ 50 pixels.
12. Press the D and X keys to set the foreground color to white.
13. Start clicking the cursor around eyes, lips, noses to restore some detail in those areas.
14. If you're not getting back quite enough detail, duplicate the Background again and drag the duplicate to the top of the layer stack.
15. Add another Hide All layer mask.
16. Airbrush wherever you want more detail restored, but don't overdo it!
17. Back to the Find Edges layer. Turn it on. YIKES! Overkill on the line detail. That's OK.
18. X to exchage foreground and background colors. (Foreground color should be black at this point. If not, press D.)
19. Start airbrushing areas where you want to tone down the line detail. To speed things up while you're doing this you may want to increase the Opacity and Flow values. There's nothing scientific about this process. Airbrush out what you don't like. You can, of course, press X to restore white as the foreground color and "paint back in" some of the lines.

At this point I was almost OK with the result -- except for a weird looking, misplaced pinkish clump of color near where mom was planting her kiss. If your creation has a misplaced glob of color here (or anywhere), here's one way to fix it:
20. Turn off all layers except for the sharpened Charcoal layer.
21. Create a new layer above the sharpened Charcoal layer.
22. Right-click anywhere over the image and reduce brush diameter to about 15 pixels.
23. While holding down the Alt key, sample a good (more normal looking)color in the vacinity of the area you want to fix.
24. Start airbrushing to cover up the blob.
25. Repeat the previous two step as often as needed until the blob is covered with more appropriate looking colors.
26. Change blend mode to Color. This colors the image while allowing the texture from the layer below to show through.
27. Turn on the layers above.
28. Crop image as you see fit.

Final layer stack (top to bottom):
* Copy of Background, hide all layer mask. Used to restore fine detail. You may or may not need this layer.
* Copy of Background, hide all layer mask. Dry Brush filter applied. Also used to restore detail around mouth, eyes, noses.
* Copy of Background, regular layer mask. Blend=Darken. Airbrush black where you don't want lines to show or to lessen their impact.
* Layer where color airbrushed to fix ugly blob. Blend=Color.
* Copy of Background. Impressionist Charcoal > Default applied, followed by a huge dose of Unsharp Mask to give the layer a lot of texture and personality.
* Background.

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OK... Now that we've gone through all that, here's a variation that I like a lot.

With the same layered image you were working on:
1. Duplicate Background.
2. Drag the duplicate below the Find Edges layer and above the fix-paint-blobs layer.
3. Impressionist > Conte > Unsmudged Monichrome.
3A. Before you click Apply, click the More Controls button.
4. From the dropdown menu, choose Colors.
5. Change the Stroke Color setting from Grayscale to Image.
6. Click Apply.
7. On mine, I changed the Find Edges blend mode from Darken to Multiply.

One more variation and that's enough for one night:
1. Add a Hue/Saturation layer mask to the top of the layer stack and set the Saturation value to -100.
2. Add either a Levels or Curves adjustment layer above that and adjust the controls as needed to fine tune the grayscale tones and contrast.

~Danny~

[kiska]

I like the last one especially.
BTW, I had the hardest time trying to alleviate the blue cast on the chin and cheek areas from the girl's shirt. Any ideas?

[DannyRaphael]

Originally Posted by kiska

I like the last one especially.
BTW, I had the hardest time trying to alleviate the blue cast on the chin and cheek areas from the girl's shirt. Any ideas?

Would steps 20-26 above be of any use in this one?

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On this version I started by duplicating the original Background. Then I created a new layer, filled it with black and added a hide all layer mask. The background was subdued by airbrushing white on the layer mask.

After merging these layers into a new layer, I applied the Impressionist > Pencil sketch > Detail Colored style. I duplicated the original background, dragged this layer to the top of the layer stack and added another hide all layer mask. With airbrush on and white as a foreground color I restored some detail around the eyes, lips and ears.

Flattened and saved.

Opened the image in Corel Painter 8 and went all over the image foreground with the Grainy Blender 10 variant of the Blenders group. I used Grainy Blender 30 for most of the background, returning to Grainy Blender 10 for fine tuning. Saved and closed Painter.

Opened up the Painter modified image in Photoshop. Applied some Unsharp Mask to give more definition to the strokes and tweaked colors/contrast with a Levels adjustment layer.

~Danny~

[kiska]

OOOOOh! I think this one wins the prize. Thanks for the tip on the color cast. I'll give it a try.

[Neve]

Thanks for the tuts Danny, I'll have to save them up and try them out next month. Your last submission is really marvellous and well executed. Kiska - both of yours are perfect!

PSP8.01

Duped bottom layer - Glowing Edges applied
Layer Blend Mode - Screen 50%
Merged both layers. Duped layer.
2nd layer - Paint Alchemy Plugin (which is new to me and haven't had
time to play much with it....applied Oil Canvas Detail)
Blend Mode - Soft Light
Duped - Blend mode Screen 25%
Merged all.

Applied a texture.