What are you working on (in April 2023)?

[Susan Ewart]

47 minutes ago, Mary Solaas said:

I've just discovered what CF Spark can do.  So I will show what I have been playing with today.  The last 5 are something I just asked it to create with a description.  The others are from a beginning picture.

Those are very neat.  I tried it but didnt get good results and it kept saying I was in line and it took more than 5 minutes.  I am not that patient, the results were not great.  For me I find it a dilemma.  If i think it but dont have the skills to execute it,  and I have someone/something else design it, who is the artist?  I do understand it is a tool in our toolbox and we should use all the tools at our disposal.  I will come around as it has very pleasing results for you.  I think I'm not creative enough or perhaps descriptive enough to get those needed results.  That 3rd from the left top row flower grouping is really pretty and would make a great paper.  Maybe I should re-think my logic.

 

[Donna Sillia]

An Easter card. The daffodils and leaves were extracted from photos of daffodils in my yard. Bow is a Cassel bow. I made the plaid and the letters are from my kit altered to change stroke and fill.

[Susan Ewart]

Those are beautiful flowers.  I love that plaid.  

[Donna Sillia]

26 minutes ago, Susan Ewart said:

Those are beautiful flowers.  I love that plaid.  

Thank you, Susan. I never really cared for plaids, but, all of a sudden, I am loving making them and using them.

[Mary Solaas]

3 hours ago, Susan Ewart said:

Those are very neat.  I tried it but didnt get good results and it kept saying I was in line and it took more than 5 minutes.  I am not that patient, the results were not great.  For me I find it a dilemma.  If i think it but dont have the skills to execute it,  and I have someone/something else design it, who is the artist?  I do understand it is a tool in our toolbox and we should use all the tools at our disposal.  I will come around as it has very pleasing results for you.  I think I'm not creative enough or perhaps descriptive enough to get those needed results.  That 3rd from the left top row flower grouping is really pretty and would make a great paper.  Maybe I should re-think my logic.

 

That was my favorite too.  The picture I started with was one I took in Louisiana some years ago of some camillia flowers that had fallen on the ground.  There was some green leaves in the picture too and I had taken it and put it through pic to painting before I put it through CF Spark.  The last 5 I was just playing around with thoughts and spelled them out and they were the results.  The abstract pics were the result of taking a presented pic of a bouquet that I asked for enameled lines.  Just fun and I'll see what I do with it all later.

[Michele]

I really don't know where to post this, but I just watched the Tag! You're It! class. However, I can't download the Handout. Did anyone else have this issue?

[Ann Seeber]

18 minutes ago, Michele said:

I really don't know where to post this, but I just watched the Tag! You're It! class. However, I can't download the Handout. Did anyone else have this issue?

Michele: I just looked at it and the handout is not a hot link for download... yet. Sometimes there's a lag getting it transcribed. I just sent the question to Carole via the gold tab on the lower right "Need Help?"

Edited April 7, 2023 by Ann Seeber

[Cassel]

2 hours ago, Michele said:

I really don't know where to post this, but I just watched the Tag! You're It! class. However, I can't download the Handout. Did anyone else have this issue?

It usually takes a couple of weeks to get the guidebook transcribed and formated.

[Mary Solaas]

I've been playing with that reflection effect.  I'll post the dark blue sample that was posted by Donna and for the comparison the one Ive been playing with.  Many different layers but really using a glitter by Cassel and using different blend modes (mostly soft light) and then playing with effects>texture effects>mosaic glass several times, and then sharpness several times, this is what I came up with.  Oh, yeah, also effects>distortion effects> fine weave also.  While I was playing, I had Donna's image up for comparison with what I was doing.

Edited April 7, 2023 by Mary Solaas

[Donna Sillia]

3 minutes ago, Mary Solaas said:

I've been playing with that reflection effect.  I'll post the dark blue sample that was posted by Donna and for the comparison the one Ive been playing with.  Many different layers but really using a glitter by Cassel and using different blend modes (mostly soft light) and then playing with effects>texture effects>mosaic glass several times, and then sharpness several times, this is what I came up with.  Oh, yeah, also effects>distortion effects> fine weave also.  While I was playing, I had Donna's image up for comparison with what I was doing.

Gorgeous, Mary. Is there anyway that you can post the steps?

[Mary Solaas]

18 minutes ago, Donna Sillia said:

Gorgeous, Mary. Is there anyway that you can post the steps?

I'll go back and look at the steps I took in several different pspimages.  However, there has got to be a way of doing it without all the playing around I did.  What finally helped was having your image up alongside the one I was working on.  But, now I have to get dressed and get real and get ready for the 3pm service at Resurrection Church.

[Susan Ewart]

3 hours ago, Mary Solaas said:

I'll go back and look at the steps I took in several different pspimages.  However, there has got to be a way of doing it without all the playing around I did.  What finally helped was having your image up alongside the one I was working on.  But, now I have to get dressed and get real and get ready for the 3pm service at Resurrection Church.

I think you just made a fabulous quote, "Get dressed and get real!"  You mean business and so does that quote.  

[Mary Solaas]

I have played with this for the past several days as I have had time.  I am very OCD.  I cannot, for the life of me, recreate what I did to get this result.  I cannot figure out which pspimage I used to get this result (as I had made several).  So, what you see is what you get and I have to leave it at that.

[MoniqueN.]

On 4/7/2023 at 3:25 AM, Donna Sillia said:

An Easter card. The daffodils and leaves were extracted from photos of daffodils in my yard. Bow is a Cassel bow. I made the plaid and the letters are from my kit altered to change stroke and fill.

A very nice one to put on an actual card and send it!?

[MoniqueN.]

My son and his girlfriend don't want their daughter (my granddaughter) on the internet, so I had to blur her?

I changed the photo with Adobe capture in a line drawing. All the other elements are from kits in my stash, mostly from pixelscrapper.?

Edit: (I removed the project, it didn't feel right somehow)

Edited April 18, 2023 by MoniqueN.
(I removed the project, it didn't feel right somehow)

[Anne Lamp]

1 hour ago, MoniqueN. said:

My son and his girlfriend don't want their daughter (my granddaughter) on the internet, so I had to blur her?

I changed the photo with Adobe capture in a line drawing. All the other elements are from kits in my stash, mostly from pixelscrapper.?

 

[Anne Lamp]

Nice layout. Thanks for telling why the face is blurred out.  I don't blame them, I refuse to post hardly any of my family's children's photos and very few of the adult ones on the internet.  I know their pictures are all over the place becaus everyone else in the family post them. 

[Mary Solaas]

I'm too OCD.  I couldn't stop working on that glimmer effect.  I'm going to post the last 2 I worked on last night and took down the steps I took to achieve the result.  Donna, maybe this is what you are looking for.  I did try to do it in black and white thinking that I could colorize them with some of the tools in PSP, however, that doesn't seem to work and keep the shininess we are trying to achieve, but I'll show it anyway.

I worked in a 1000 pixel square.  1: Fill with a light color; 2: New layer: use a darker hue of the same color; 3: Use the paint brush (I chose the cloud brush - used size 50, but you may like a larger size which I used in the 2nd one, hardness 50, step 5, density 100, thickness 100, opacity 100, check Smart Edge - and brush all over the layer; You can merge the 2 layers - I merged visible to a new layer; 4: use a small gautian blur - I used 5; 5: Effects>Texture>Mosaic Antique - I set it with # of columns 75, check Symmetric, tile diffusion 100, grout width 10, grout diffusion 15; 6: effects>texture>mosaic Glass - I set it with # columns 100, check Symmetric, glass curvature 75, edge curvature 3, grout width 3, grout diffusion 0; 7: Adjust>Sharpness  - I did this about 3 times.  I did save as a pspimage as well as a jpg.  Since it won't post at 1000 pixels, I resized it to 600 pixels square.

Edited April 11, 2023 by Mary Solaas

[Mary Solaas]

This is the black and white one.  I made it on only 1 layer - using the above steps.  I tried changing color with Adjust>Hue, Saturation, Lightness - but you can see that it doesn't work very well so maybe you need to choose the color first and then create it.

[Mary Solaas]

and while i'm at it -- I also worked with the CF Spark images I showed previously.  With my camillia picture which I ran through pic to painting and CF Spark, I finally chose the one that Susan liked and made a pattern from it in a smaller size and made a paper with it  - playing with it on a 45 degree angle really came out interesting.  I also made a paper from one of the patterns made by another artist in watercolors that was posted in Spark.

[Donna Sillia]

On 4/10/2023 at 9:15 AM, MoniqueN. said:

A very nice one to put on an actual card and send it!?

Thank you, Monique, I actually made the daffodil bouquet and plaid for a March birthday card. I used Vectortube on her name and the bow for the March birthstone which was created using FF crystal and a preset shape made into a tube.

Edited April 11, 2023 by Donna Sillia

[Susan Ewart]

37 minutes ago, Mary Solaas said:

This is the black and white one.  I made it on only 1 layer - using the above steps.  I tried changing color with Adjust>Hue, Saturation, Lightness - but you can see that it doesn't work very well so maybe you need to choose the color first and then create it.

These are great.  thank you for the steps!

 

[Susan Ewart]

28 minutes ago, Mary Solaas said:

and while i'm at it -- I also worked with the CF Spark images I showed previously.  With my camillia picture which I ran through pic to painting and CF Spark, I finally chose the one that Susan liked and made a pattern from it in a smaller size and made a paper with it  - playing with it on a 45 degree angle really came out interesting.  I also made a paper from one of the patterns made by another artist in watercolors that was posted in Spark.

WOW!  These are fabulous.  particularly love this watercolor paper.  Great color combo too.  Would've made a great paper/palette for the Build A Kit.

 

[Bonnie Ballentine]

I went back to 2006 for this photo and memory. These are 4 of 5 of my NOVA United Basketball teammates. We attended Not Too Late Senior Women's Basketball Camp. After camp was over and we were waiting until time to go to the airport, we toured Portland, Maine. Behind us is Portland Head Light. This is one of my favorite pictures. The template is by Carole...cass-watercolor page...thank you, Carole!

[Corrie Kinkel]

On 4/10/2023 at 3:30 PM, MoniqueN. said:

My son and his girlfriend don't want their daughter (my granddaughter) on the internet, so I had to blur her?

I changed the photo with Adobe capture in a line drawing. All the other elements are from kits in my stash, mostly from pixelscrapper.?

Monique I never use photos of my granddaughters in layouts! I tried blurring their faces but I don't like that. So I don't do it with 1 0r 2 exceptions and on those cases with permission, they weren't recognizable in the first place?