Hosta Bloom

[Julie Kenward]

Man, I haven't played with textures in over a year so this was a great reminder to get back to them. I started with an image of a hosta bloom and then added a blurry bokeh image I had created last summer that was green/yellow/white and converted that to an overlay layer with reduced opacity. Next step was to add a painted texture over the top of those two and changed that to a soft light layer with reduced opacity. Next, I calmed down the bright greens with a saturation/Hue adjustment, and finally added a 'dark edge/light center' filter from Nik Efex over the top.

I now see I could probably stand to erase a little more texture over the flowers but it's a nice start.

(Great tip: whenever you are outside and there is bright light and a fairly solid background [such as grass, clouds, leaves on the ground, etc.] or you can get some nice OOF bokeh, set your camera to manual focus and let it all blur together and then take the photograph - it will leave you with some great background images that you can use in the textured photographs.)

[denise ippolito]

Jules, I like it ALOT. This came out nice. The colors and the texture look really good. I think this week should be fun to see all the different processing ideas.:)

[Patti Edens]

I love the colors here and seeing what multiple layers of texture will do. I really appreciate the detailed steps and the tip for taking photos to be used as texture layers.

[Cindy Mead]

a lovely comp to start with Jules.. I like how the texture resembles a wet pane of glass, very cool effect and a great choice of texture. If this were mine, I might remove some of the texture from more of the petals, especially the one on the bottom with the nice curved anthers. Besides using a layer mask or the eraser to remove texture, a much quicker step (although it's not as precise) is to take your lasso tool and select the area you want to remove the texture from then hit it with guassian blur.. then deselect and you're good to go :)

[Nick Palmieri]

Very nice effect, appreciate you sharing the work flow.

[Connie Mier]

Great tips, Julie. This is beautiful and even without the manipulation, the composition is eye catching. I like how the unopened flower captures the immediate attention.

[Julie Kenward]

Cindy, thanks for the tip - I never would have thought to try that! I'll give it a go tonight if I get time.

[Indranil Sircar]

Beautiful composition, Julie. Nice colors and texture.

[Cheryl Slechta]

Julie, goregous textures. Thank you and Cindy for your tips:)

[Paul Lagasi]

I like the softness of it...if you know what I mean...nice