"Two Women Dual Textured with Map" Corel

Two Women Dual Textured with Map

Another image with layering of a Public Domain Map, showing Michigan and surrounding areas. The Dual Textures are the Map and a Stone Texture from StockVault. (The brownish tint to the Map is the Stone Texture.)

I began with the Women ( from Morguefile) in Corel PSP Pro X3, I used the Threshold tool for white and black space. I left enough detail to satisfy me for their faces and hair. I next copied and layered the Map with a slight change with Curves for the depth of colors.

I selected another Stone Texture and adjusted the darkness of the Stone to a light color before applying the property Burn (or was it Dodge?) one or the other. This gave the brownish tint to the Map.

I added my signature and merged all layers, saving the large iteration. I viewed the full image and found that the Map made a nice border for the sides but too much white on the bottom. I opened in Corel PhotoPaint and added a black border to the entire image. Here I also resampled the image for display with compression set at 75 and smoothing at 33, with the JPG Optimized. I saved that and then posted to "gatzkART!".

NOTE: You may noticed I have another Single Tune For Sale at CDBaby to the right. Called "The Roof," it is a three track instrumental done with my 12-String Guitar in the Alternate Tuning of DADGAD. It is a mellow and soothing Tune that builds to a climax. Go to the link and have a listen to a short excerpt about 30 seconds long. You can buy it there or click off the tab to close the purchase page. Thank you for your considering some of my music.

"Art Deco Panel with Women and Vase" Corel

Art Deco Panel with Women and Vase

I scanned in an Art Deco Panel from Art Deco Interiors And Panel Designs collection by Stephen Calloway. I used 300dpi and 8.5" x 11" size for the original Panel scan with my Canon MP495. I had also used some recent Samplers Clip Art from Dover Publications for this Digital Collage, thus the Women and Vase. I did get the upper most women and vase from the Free Vintage Digital Stamps site.

I assembled the Collage in Corel PhotoPaint. I used the Tone Curve on each piece and also the large iteration before saving. I used Filter Forge's Photo Effect to increase the color Saturation Vibrancy then added a Filter Forge Frame Film Frame to darken the edges of the piece.

I had to use Filter Forge's effects on the display size as I only have the Free versions of Photo Effects and Frames from them, the original iteration was just too large.

I truly enjoy Digital Visual Collage work and like working with Dover Publications and the Free Vintage Digital Stamps pieces when creating these pieces. I like to use the Vibrancy tool for the punch it gives to the colors, especially scanned in colors. These Art Deco Panels and designs, along with the Art Nouveau designs I use are among my favorite periods of Design.

"Review 'Merry Go Round' by Shani"

"Merry Go Round"

I had the privilege of creating an image of Singer Songwriter +Shani S  and as a result I won a signed copy of her new Album. I have spent time listening to it today closer than my first pass. The image you see is of the cover of the album, I did not create it. Credits are on the Album cover inside and out.

Entitled "Merry Go Round," it is alternative pop with great emotion and strong songs. She has a delightful singing voice and the mix is fabulous. One of my favorites is the song "I Am," and I really like the bluesy intro to the title song "Merry Go Round," my second favorite. A bit of RnB piano in it and a pleasant blues guitar riff that relaxes you and then she sings again about it being "bolted to the ground." Fantastic!

I don't regularly review albums so you'll have to excuse my few words and if I am inaccurate in the terminology. I thoroughly enjoyed the entire album. It is soft, tender, hard hitting and emotionally charged with fine lyrics and wonderful backup musicians along with great Artwork.

Her website is at:  http://shanirose.com/

"Old-Fashioned Beautiful Women" Dover - Corel - Plus

Old-Fashioned Beautiful Women

I was browsing in Picasa 3.9 in my Dover Clip Art folder and found two pieces of artwork. The first was a grouping of glazed clay studies, soft in color. The second is this great collection of "Old-Fashioned Beautiful Women."

I took the first image and from Picasa opened with Corel Painter Photo Essentials 4 and auto painted using the Pastel Drawing setting with a soft brush. I saved that iteration. I opened that with Corel PhotoPaint.

I then copied to the clipboard from Picasa the "Women," and opened with New from Clipboard in PhotoPaint. each lady had a clip art number below them that I painted out with white paint, basic brush. I then copied and pasted them onto the background piece.

I used the property Multiply for transparency to allow the background to show through. I merged the two into one image. Then I applied Filter Forge's Photo Effects Vibrance to boost the colors just a bit. I added my signature and resampled the image for display size.

I really like Dover Publications Clip Art and enjoy making these types of images. This one highlights the beauty of women at another time and place, rather romantically, one might say.