I’ve always been able to play with pictures to create all kinds of things, from simple alterations like removing or adding a person, taking liberties with colours, or creating something entirely fictional. I enjoy doing it and, if I was to be completely honest, I also enjoyed the knowledge that not everyone can do that kind of stuff.

Then I found picmonkey and it was so easy to adjust colours and add effects, I kind of forgot about Photoshop for a while. All I did was resize, crop and add the occasional effect to images for a long time.

That is, till recently when I got Adobe CS6 on my laptop. Now I’ve started doing stuff with PS again and remembering why I loved it. Like the Christmas and New Year’s cards. Those were quick and easy, removing type and creating backgrounds where I needed them… but doing something like the banner, that’s way more fun.

I used to do a lot of that type of thing for websites, but I don’t design websites for people any more. Here’s one I designed for my poodle website years ago, using 4 separate images: a photograph of a drawing I’d done of my first standard poodle (Pagan), some pastels, a background and a photo I took of Pagan at a show.

But I digress. I was posting to share an amazing effect I found in Photoshop that I’d never known before. Its called Oil Paint and its under Filters.

Here are some pics I played with – the mist in the hills opposite our place on a hot rainy day. Before:

After:

After:

Ok, pretty good but definitely not its strong point.

It really comes into its own when you do something like this – the trellis in the yard with rusty chains, the birdhouse I made and an old lantern. Before:

After:

And after:

I don’t know whether to be thrilled or depressed about this discovery. I LOVE the effect. I love the pop arty colours and the swirliness of it. I love the curly leaves and way everything looks spot on perfect.

But I’m depressed too. Cause why would anyone need to paint any more when you can do this type of thing to your photos with a filter?

Sigh.

z