1st Blur

[Dave Woeller]

This would be my first ever attempt at an in camera blur image. I obviously have much to learn. At any rate it's an abstract sculpture from Grounds for Sculpture in NJ. It's a stainless steel sculpture and the colors are picked up from the surrounding vegetation. I thought I'd throw it up for some thoughts and guidance in this new area for me.

[Diane Miller]

Blurs are so much fun -- keep working on them! I love doing verticals of trees, getting some blue sky in the exposure.

Here's something to try for extra punch -- stack two similar (but not too similar) ones as layers in PS and experiment with the blend mode of the top layer. Usually Overlay, Soft Light or Hard Light works best. You can change the opacity of the top layer and the contrast of either layer, and sometimes flipping the top layer horizontally works best.

You can also distort each layer to straighten verticals and the like, and of course you can resize both.

[Dave Woeller]

Thank you for the information Diane. It certainly gives me some direction for experimentation.

[Cheryl Slechta]

Dave, I think this is a very pleasing blur and I think it was creative to do it of a sculpture with the greens reflected from the plants. It has a stained glass look that I like. I might tone down the 2 brighter patches in the upper left corner.

[Dave Woeller]

Cheryl, I couldn't agree more on the two bright spots. Onward and upward

[Kerry Perkins]

Hi Dave, good for you to step outside the box a little further and try these. I had never even thought about doing one before I came to BPN. You did a good job with your concept and the execution will become easier as you learn to predict what the outcome will be. I'm looking forward to more of these!

[Dave Woeller]

Thank you Kerry. The first one was a real learning experience in itself. :-)