I photographed the brilliant bougainvillea in a stunning garden in San Jose, Costa Rica last winter. The swirling is a photoshop filter, spin radial blur. When I looked closely at the bougainvillea I noticed each flower had a white center. One of those became the focal point of this blur. I left just a few un-blurred flowers on the edge to give a bit of reality. I am still at the stage of just using one or two effects at a time. I am very impressed with those postings having a multitude of effects and I am setting a goal of working towards that! Thanks to all for such wonderful inspiration.
Nancy, Welcome back-hope your trip was fantastic and I'm looking forward to seeing your images. I remember the first one of these that I did. I fell in love w/ the filter. Did you know that Cindy Cone won IOTY in OOTB using this technique as her base. I love the bright Bougainvillea color and the way you got the white center in the center of your twirl! You can also experiment w/ cropping and using the white center as a ROT point. Lots can be done w/ this filter, you can do two separate layers twirling in different directions and blend them together w/ one of the blend modes or w/ layer masks. Have fun and share your experiments with us!!:)
For me, the stuff that you left on the edges is distracting. Thus the repost:) In this case, tighter is righter! Also did a bit of color work....
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I do like the way you focused on the central part of the flower. As Denise mentioned, I do love experimenting with twirls. In addition to the radial blur, I also use Photoshop Distort/Twirl. Denise has some good suggestions. I like adding layers and blending or erasing some of the effects. The experimentation part is what is fun.
Last edited by Cindy Cone; 05-16-2010 at 08:24 AM.
Swirling Bougainvillea
