Image Editing
This section here shows off what can be done with one basic image to alter it but not add anything to it that wasn't already there.
Digital Image Manipulation - Kent Digital (Group Ashford)
The image below was given to me when I belonged to the Kent Digital Group and our goal was to come up with something different but you couldn't add anything to the image that wasn't already there in the first place.
Here is the original image:
As you can see it needs at least a little TLC to bring out the best in it but we can do much more than that...
This image manipulation is a particular favourite and shows off the liquify tool in Photoshop.
One of my kaleidoscopes.
A little basic drawing here, kind of childlike but I never said I was an artist ;-)
This is my all time favourite out of all the manipulations I did and I think you'd be hard pushed to even tie it into the original image.
A painterly effect and texturiser layer added to try and make it look like a painting.
This image is just lots of repeats of the original each one shrunk down and toned to a different colour. I quite like this effect.
A second kaleidoscope and I think this works better than the one above.
Hopefully the above will give any budding Photoshop peeps out there the incentive to have a play, that's really the only way to learn about the program itself and if it goes wrong who cares, all you've really wasted is some time and in lots of ways it's not time wasted as you'll have picked up some useful knowledge along the way.
My Photoshop Manipulation
This next section showcases some of my digital manipulation using my own images. Sometimes it's been for a competition, other times simply for my own enjoyment. I often spend hours dabbling in Photoshop with an image just to see what can be done, it doesn't always turn out favourable but you'll have learnt something along the way so where's the harm?
One of my favourite filters is the Buzz filter which "simplifies" aspects of the images to create a painterly effect. (You can click on the images below to see a larger version of them).
I have several "recipes" for the settings within Buzz that I use although it's important to have the images at its final size before applying it as if you then shrink the image down the effect is somewhat neutralised.
This image shows the effects of the Buzz filter combined with a digital lith effect. It was created for a Monochrome competition at the Invicta Camera Club.
This image is just using Buzz to soften the poppies into a painted like effect. A warm up effect has also been added although the photo was taken in evening light.
This is obviously The Needles on the Isle of Wight. I followed a magazine tutorial to age the photo and blend it with another image of a distressed background so that it gives the appearance of the photo being really old.
This image started off as a piece of wrought iron hanging on the wall in a museum. I sometimes use the Invert command within Photoshop on a copy layer to then blend with the original background layer thus creating an unusual colour scheme. It has then been converted into a type of kaleidoscope shape by flipping the layers around until I found something I liked.
This image was created for the KCPA Digital Competition. I created the cube shapes and then moved various images onto the sides, added a background and some shadowing on the layers and voila!
This image combines various settings within another Photoshop plug-in called Paint Engine. By using layers and applying different combinations of this plug-in it is possible to create a realistic painterly effect.
This "sketch" comes from using a filter that I read about online, called the Impressionist Filter. It came on old full copies of Microsoft's Frontpage 98/2000 and is quite an impressive piece of software if a little complicated to use.
This next batch just shows a small selection of things can be done to manipulate any image within Photoshop.
Part of a flower, toned with a white vignette added.
Colieus plant, desaturated leaving just the red part and a black vignette added.
Leaf with a digital Lith effect applied.
Shanklin Chine at night, buzz filter applied and colours saturated.
Plant image which has been inverted.
Plant image that has been duo toned and a soft focus effect added.
Colour popped image, also using buzz effect.
Torch trails heavily manipulated using gradient effects.
Shopping mall mobile - again colour popped and a sketch effect added.
Winter plants, buzz effect added and the centre portion selected and promoted to a new layer where layer styles have been added.
Seed heads - again the image was inverted and blended with the background layer using the Difference Blend mode.
A piece of tree bark, turned into a kaleidoscope and the zoom filter applied. I like this one very much but it makes my eyes go funny. Try looking at the full version and you'll see what I mean.
Photoshop Fractals
Having seen some of these images created on the web I did a quick search for some sites giving a How To... on the best way to create these unusal images. One of the best links I found was at PSD TUTS+ and here are some of my first attempts below...
This is my attempt at following the tutorial in the link above. The hardest bit is defining the Free Transform bit, getting the placement of the image so that the repetitions give the desired effect, but you can always undo it and try again until you get it right.
This is using a star selection from a bluebell photo and then recoloured as the image transforms, similar to the above. I then used a gradient fill to colour the image using blend modes to get the effect I wanted.
This last attempt used a pattern brush to give me the original starting point. Again gradients and blend modes were used on the final image to add something a little different.
This is quite a fun technique and one which I will enjoy exploring. It would make quite good wallpapers for Windows desktops or maybe backgrounds for other images, who knows the possibilities are endless. I shall have to try it with portions of images to see what happens. I enjoy making kaleidoscopes out of ordinary photos so this is just an extension to that.
If you like what you see above try using Google to search for Photoshop Fractals and see what you can discover!
Twirling Technique
Twirling is a Photoshop Filter technique which is becoming very popular at the moment (2020). It involves a few of the basic Photoshop filters being applied in a particular order to create wonderful abstracts of the original image. Using the technique described at the video below you can even create a Photoshop action to replicate this technique really easily without having to remember the steps!
This YouTube video is the best one I found to explain the technique and it even goes on to do a symmetrical version too!
Original Image
Half of the Twirl Technique
I quite like just this halfway house effect :-)
Final Image
So this is the final fully symmetrical twirled image - pretty awesome, very random, you're never quite sure what you're going to get, which is half the fun and apart from the colours in the image you would never know what it started out as!
Floral Art Project
Garden Windmill
Another Peony
Well that's it in this section for now. Hope it's given you some food for thought and even if you don't like all the effects here it shows that any image can be spruced up and whilst you are doing it you'll learn about Photoshop.