During my trip in September, I found Alaska to be exactly as I expected, wild and exceptionally beautiful. But I discovered something I never expected. I found the oil pipeline to be fascinating, an extraordinary engineering feat that did try to take the environment into account as well as build the pipeline to be able to endure the extremes of weather and geology. Our photo guide was very well versed in pipeline information and amazed us with engineering details. In view of the theme, Nature's Bounty, I wanted this image to not only include some of the beauty of Alaska, but also the oil that is abundant up there. We drove the entire 500 miles of the pipeline road from Fairbanks to Deadhorse. Actually being among the people of Alaska provided me a much more detailed perspective of oil extraction than one gets from the news here in the lower 48.
Used my newly purchased Alien Snap Art, detailed oil paint, a fractalius outline preset that I created, and a layer of Topaz Adjust 5, paint Venice.
11-11-2014, 04:29 PM
Hazel Grant
Beautiful Alaska! Been on that road. It is wonderful. This is an artistic rendering that shows the colors of Nature's bounty there. I do find the central water between the land and the reflection a bit of a distraction, though.
11-12-2014, 10:15 PM
Paul Lagasi
Nice effects, at first I thought this was a boardwalk....some excellent scenery in Alaska. TFS
11-12-2014, 11:07 PM
Jackie Schuknecht
I like the colours a lot in this one Nancy. Simple and effective composition with great processing. If it were mine I might take just a sliver off the top.
11-12-2014, 11:54 PM
Kerry Perkins
Very nice Nancy, amazing scenery and wildness. I like your formula, it made an interesting pen and ink line treatment to the image.
11-13-2014, 06:05 PM
Nancy Bell
Thanks all for your thoughtful comments!
11-15-2014, 05:01 PM
Cheryl Slechta
Hi, Nancy, great combination of filtering and I also like to see Fractalius thrown into the mix:S3:
11-18-2014, 03:10 PM
Anita Bower
I just looked up Deadhorse to Fairbanks on Google Maps--wow! What an experience you had.
Wonderful simplicity, clarity and colors in this image. I see the point Hazel made about that one patch of water. Did you do something different with the sky? It doesn't have the same look as the rest of the image.
11-20-2014, 11:26 PM
Dennis Bishop
The color combination and the curving lines in the bottom from the cloud reflections and the grasses make this image for me. The water between those curved lines doesn't bother me at all. In fact, I think it might be a good thing. I agree with Jackie's suggestion about cropping from the top. It strengthens the composition and still leaves plenty of beauty. If it were mine, I'd add a warming photo filter adjustment layer to add a bit more orange and change the hue of the blues just a bit.
The Fractalius outlines . . . Did you find a way to do that in the latest version or are you using the previous one? (I stayed with the previous one so my outline presets wouldn't be lost.)
