"The Lone Street Musician" PE5 Plus

The Lone Street Musician

Another photograph of "The Lone Street Musician." I liked the image from the beginning. A Street Guitarist, possibly a singer as well, presenting himself in a corner of a plaza.

I opened the file in Corel Painter Essentials 5 (PE5.) I began by applying the Pen and Ink Drawing settings. I tried one brush but it was not very clear, and I wanted a clean, bright Pen and Ink look. So I set the Brush to the Dry Ink and painted again. This gave me a better drawing.

To add to the Ink Drawing, I selected the Detailed Watercolor setting. A soft light brush was chosen the New Simple Water Brush. I digitally painted again. This gave me a Pen and Ink Watercolor image.

The next step was to increase color depth of the piece. I selected Equalize from the Effects. There I set the Black Point to 21.2% and left the White Point at 100%. I altered the Gamma to 60%, and this punched up the color. I saved this large file with a new name.

Next, I opened the file in Paint.NET. I selected the Line Brush at 3 points, with a Backwards slash setting. I hand painted a light border with the brush. I opened my signature file, copied it, and added it as a new layer. Using the property Multiply, I then merged the layers. I saved this file at 100% compression.

I now only needed to Resize the piece for display. I adjusted it to 72dpi, 1220 X 1049, with 75 as the compression. I saved this file with a new name.

"White Bearded Man Portrait" Corel

White Bearded Man Portrait

Back to Bearded Men Digital Portraits in today's exercise. I saw this portrait online recently and was immediately taken by the man's countenance. I just wanted to digitally paint him. So I downloaded from Morguefile and began to think about the endeavor.

To give greater detail to the image I opened it in Corel Painter Photo Essentials 4 first. It began as a grayscale image, I used the Watercolor Sketch tool, Rough Paper, Saturate color (grayscale,) Dry Bristle Brush. I digitally painted it there for the sketchiness. This gave me a great piece to Digitally Paint by hand further in Corel Painter 11.

After I saved the large iteration I opened in Painter 11. I used my color palette with the Flesh tones and Earth tones appended, my current favorite palette. I used the Digital Watercolors Brushes, starting with a Coarse Dry Mop brush. I began to paint the fleshtones selecting ones darker than usual, and laid a background to work with. I added colors as I went selecting almost randomly. I varied the size of the brush as I painted, smaller to larger, back to smaller.

When I came to the Beard I selected the Liquid Ink Brushes for greater detail in his white hair and beard. I chose very small strokes for the beard and varied them only a bit as you can see, some larger some very small. This gave me a great effect for some realism sketchiness in the beard.

I painted the eyeglasses as Tortoise Shell, as the details indicated and the beginning photograph had shown. I selected a Digital Watercolor Green and some Yellow for the sweater, and background, adding in a touch of each to the face and eyes. I had layers of Digital Watercolor and Liquid Ink I selected all layers and Dropped all. This blended much of the colors together, as you will notice the green about the eyes. An unexpected result, perhaps a unhappy accident for the eyes only.

I saved the large iteration and opened in Corel PSP Pro X3, viewing it there I upped the colors by 33 in Saturation Vibrancy. I always use Vibrancy toward the punch that move brings to the pieces I paint digitally. I did not use Curves or the Smart Photo Fix at all on this image. Satisfied with the end result I added a layer with my signature, sizing and placing it, then merging the layers to one. Saved a large iteration then resized for display in this post.

"Full Beard, Long Hair" Corel

Full Beard, Long Hair

I made the time to do this Digital Painting this afternoon and evening. Using another Mans Portrait from Morguefile I painted the image in Corel Painter 11. "Full Beard, Long Hair," began in Corel Painter Photo Essentials 4 as a Watercolor Sketch in grayscale.

I saved the large file and opened it in Corel Painter 11. There I used the Digital Watercolor Brushes on the face and beard. I switched to another layer for Liquid Ink Brushes to add details to his hair and beard. I also used the Inks for the background and added some more Digital Watercolor for dark contrasts.

I saved the large image after layering in my signature and merging Layers. I opened in Corel PSP Pro X3 for Saturation Vibrancy set at 33. I saved the image and resized for display here.

I have been working on two new songs for placing on CDBaby. I am completing the mixing now on one. The other is over eight minutes long and needs some thought and revising to make it practical for selling. Right now, I am enjoying working on it and don't mind its length.

Watch this blog for a posting about the new song soon! Per usual I will have it set for Full Preview for your consideration.

"Homeless Da Vinci - Textured" Corel

Da Vinci by Francesco Melzi

Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci; 15 April 1452 – 2 May 1519) was an Italian painter, sculptor, architect, musician, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, geologist, cartographer, botanist, and writer. He is widely considered to be one of the greatest polymaths of all time and perhaps the most diversely talented person ever to have lived. His genius, perhaps more than that of any other figure, epitomized the Renaissance humanist ideal.**

Homeless Da Vinci

My Homeless Da Vinci is from a photograph of a man of maturity from MorgueFile. I opened the photograph in Corel PSP Pro X3. There I applied the Threshold tool for a black and white image.

I had just received from StockVault Friday Free Textures a few colored paper textures. I opened them also in PSP Pro X3 and copy and pasted as new Layers on the black and white Portrait. I first used the greenish aqua colored one, adjusting Saturation Vibrancy and Curves for more color, I applied the layer property for Transparency, thus leaving the black and white to now reflect the greenish aqua and white image.

I used a Vintage colored texture and also added that with transparency properties. I then added my signature and merged all the layers to one background.  I adjusted with the Saturation and Curves again for an added boost to the overall piece. I added a partially Transparent Frame to it. I saved that large iteration.

Next I opened with Corel's PhotoPaint to resample the file size to display here and to compress (75) and smooth (33). I saved for display.

Da Vinci's Study of Man

Leonardo's work is very famous, this is one example of one that is frequently used in design and artworks. I had to censor it due to having a "G" Rated Blog. Please excuse that if you object. Remember I am highlighting the full piece and the wonderful symmetry of it's details. Some may object to not having censored it.

** http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonardo_da_Vinci

"Shy Guy" Corel

Shy Guy

I did today's portrait with a photograph from MorgueFile and Free Texture Friday from StockVault. I really like these photographs of ragged men. Their faces tell stories of a life filled with hardship, you can't help but sympathize with them.

I opened the photograph in Corel PhotoPaint, here I used the Threshold tool on it for white space. I adjusted it for a bit more white space as the lower portion of the image is full of deep colors.

I added the layer of a Gritty Texture, rotated to portrait and fit to the subject. I applied the property Multiply for transparency, allowing it to blend with the man's face.

I added my signature with a new copyright date, in white. Also I gave it a small black border for the top of the image as a finishing touch.

I am enjoying this series of portraits and hope you are as well. Faces and Eyes tell tales we cannot ignore. Love that, don't you?

"Bearded Smiling Man with Texture" Corel

Bearded Smiling Man

Due to a truly busy schedule I have not posted in many days. Having some time today allowed me to create this image and post it.

I got the free Man's Portrait from MorgueFile's site and the Vintage stained paper Texture from StockVault's Free Texture Friday. I opened both in Corel PhotoPaint and cropped them and then pasted as New Image from Clipboard.

I took the Man and I used the Threshold tool on it for more white space, also it highlighted his beard and eyes and mouth. I took that and copied to the clipboard and pasted it as a layer onto the Vintage Paper Texture. I used the layer property Multiply to create the transparency, allowing the Texture to show through.

I used the Tone Curve tool to add depth to the paper color. I added a black border using the Papersize tool. I then added my inverted white signature with drag and drop from a open folder window. Resizing the signature to fit the large iteration, I merged the layers to one, I then saved it. I resampled it to display size for the blog and then began my posting and workflow explanation. I used only two layers for this image, not counting my signature.

"Freehand Drawing Vintage 1980, Acrylic coated Pastel Man" Corel - Canon

Old Man Sleeping India

Pencil and Pastels Man Acrylic Coating

Digging through my past works that my son found stored away I have these to share today.

"The Old Man Sleeping India," was a freehand drawing made from a photograph that my Dad took while stationed in India during the Korean War. It is a circa 1980 Color Pastels Pencils Drawing.

The second image is a fictional "Man's Portrait," done freehand in Pastels, this was drawn on old packing paper, with the brown of the paper showing through. I took a few photographs of it and this was the clearest, I used the flash so you can see the Acrylic Coating Media I used to preserve it.

With both photographs, taken with my Canon Rebel XTi, I adjusted in Corel PSP Pro X3. Cropping, some color enhancements with Saturation, and a framing with boarder on the second image.