Anything Photoshop or Photography

Archive for December, 2012

When Was the Last Time You Saw a Phillips 66 Gas Pump?


Really loved how this 3 image HDR turned out. Who knew you could actually buy old gas pumps! They were being sold at the 38th Annual Turkey Run located in the Daytona International Speedway infield last month. The three images were stacked using the free Lightroom Photomatix Merge to 32-bit HDR if you own Photomatix HDR Pro. My duChemin Maasai Chocolate split tone preset (that I created from settings in David duChemin’s Vision & Voice: Refining Your Vision in Adobe Photoshop Lightroom  book) was also applied. In Photoshop 2 Lil Owls texture 6 (see sidebar for website link) was set to Vivid Light at 45% opacity. A Levels Adjustment Layer was added, some clean up done, and French Kiss Glorious Grunge Edging overlay border was added and changed to a dark brown color using a Solid Color Fill Layer clicked to the overlay. That was it.


Christmas Wreaths at SeaWorld


For this wonderful holiday, thought I would show this pretty image of wreaths from SeaWorld Orlando. Just a little basic processing in Lightroom before taking the image into Photoshop. Topaz (see sidebar for website link) Adjust 5’s High Key preset was applied with the Overall Transparency set to .24. Next Topaz Detail 3 was applied using the HDR Enhancement II preset. French Kiss’s Artiste Chamante texture was applied and set to Overlay at 100% opacity. My free Snow1 Overlay was next applied and set to 75% opacity. French Kiss’s Glorious Grunge Edging Overlay was applied next and a Solid Color Adjustment Layer set to a light pink was added. Since the edging did not seem to show up real well, it was duplicated along with the Adjustment Layer. That was all that was done and I love the final effect – the umbrella really added to the shot. Hope all are having a wonderful week!…..Digital Lady Syd


Little Red Corvette


Just felt like using a couple of my old standby favorite plug-ins to create a vintage feel to this image.  This old red corvette image was taken at the 39th Annual Daytona Turkey Run at the Daytona International Speedway infield. I love the way the raceway seats are in the background – it just seems to the be the right setting for this old girl – I love corvettes! It was processed first in Lightroom starting out with cropping and applying one of David duChemin’s Lightroom 4 presets called Warmer Sunset -.66 Grad – I was surprised it gave such a nice vintage feel for starting post-processing of the image. From there several adjustments basic Lightroom adjustments were done and the chrome was sharpened using an Adjustment Brush. In Photoshop Nik Viveza 2 was used with control points placed on the windshield to clean up some window glare (this plug-in does an amazing job with window glare) and on the detailing on the car. Then Nik Color Efex Pro 4 was applied and several of my favorite filters were stacked – Darken/Lighten Center, Detail Extractor, and my favorite for getting this vintage feel, Film Efex Vintage set to Film Type 14 with an overall opacity of 56%. A Curves Adjustment Layer was added and French Kiss free Glorious Grunge Edging Overlay with the lines inside removed was applied and set to a tan color. I wish I could fix up this car – she really was a beauty!…..Digital Lady Syd

Digital Lady Syd Related Blogs:
Yellow Dogface Butterfly in her Glory!
Soft and Sharp Image at the Same Time!


Christmas at SeaWorld Orlando


These “floating” trees were in the pond area at SeaWorld Orlando in October and they looked really strange. I decided to spruce them up a bit and give them that holiday feel – these must have been the first decorations they put up. I have said it before and I will say it again – whenever I cannot figure out something interesting to do with an image, OnOne’s (see website link on sidebar) Perfect Effects usually has the answer. In this case two effects were stacked: Nicely Toasted preset from the Vintage group – set to Hard Light at 74% opacity and Warm Vintage also from the Vintage Group with a few changes to Brightness (-45), Contrast (-40), and Darken Blend Mode with Strength 58. A Composite Channel Curve was set (In157/Out 138). My free Snow1 Overlay was added along with my free Merry Christmas PNG Overlay using an Outer Glow layer style set to a bluish color (Blend Mode Normal, Opacity 39%, Spread 8%, and Size 215 px) – use this trick to to make your text and overlays stand out if on a busy background. Added text layer for my name, and added French Kiss Glorious Grunge Edging Only with the grunge erased from the middle.  All of these overlays used a Solid Color Adjustment Layer set to a soft cream color sampled from the roof of the building. (Layer -> New Fill Color -> Solid Color and check Use Previous Layer to Create Clipping Mask for each overlay). The text layer used the same color. A Curves Adjustment Layer was added and the mask filled with black – with a 30% opacity white soft brush, the areas I wanted affected were painted back in the mask. That was it. Hope you can use a few of these tricks to make some nice cards…..Digital Lady Syd

Digital Lady Syd Related Blogs:
Where to Find Those Cool Free Christmas Card Templates?
Free Christmas Card Vectors and Brushes
Beautiful Christmas Flowers
Some Free Christmas Overlays to Spice Up Your Christmas Cards


Beautiful Christmas Flowers



These flowers were once again taken at the local grocery store with my little Kodak Point-and-Shoot camera. I bought four textures from Melissa Gallo’s Painted Textures website on Black Friday and love them. These are very painterly textures and create a different look! She also has some very interesting tutorial videos on how to apply a texture – keeping the texture on an image and painting in color to remove texture from parts of the image, which is what was done here. Check out her website if you enjoy textures as much as I do.

The biggest change I did on this image was in Lightroom where the White Balance eyedropper was sampled throughout the image until I found something different that I liked – it turned a rather dark fall colored image into a bright red and pink image. Totally awesome! I also used a Lightroom Adjustment Brush to sharpen the yellow centers of the flowers and some of the rose petal edges. Now following Melissa’s tutorial,  Shadowhouse Creations Vintage Soft Grunge texture V32b texture in Set 3 was applied using the Multiply blend mode at 84% opacity, along with Painted Textures Taupe Canva using Hard Light blend mode at 35% and Pink Impasto using Hard Light blend mode at 67%. A Color Balance Adjustment Layer was added to increase the red color a little in the Highlights and greens in the Shadows. A Curves Adjustment Layer was added to lighten the overall contrast of the image.

Totally loved the result!…..Digital Lady Syd

Digital Lady Syd Related Blogs:
For Tidbit Blogs, click on the Texture Category to get several more.
Where to Find Those Cool Free Christmas Card Templates?
How to Create Unique Textured Backgrounds
How to Create Unique Watercolor Background Texture
Creating That Vintage Texture Feel
Russell Brown’s Paper Texture Panel Updated!
Tips for Flower Textures
Some Free Christmas Overlays to Spice Up Your Christmas Cards


Using a Couple of My Textures



Just thought I would post a little link to how my textures can work together. These are my miniature mums on my back porch – they were processed in Lightroom using my workflow (see How to Use Adobe Camera Raw (ACR) or Lightroom 4 Quickly). Once in Photoshop clean up was done first on some of the petals, and a High Pass Filter set to radius 8 and Soft Light blend mode to sharpen the flowers. Next my free Pastel Watercolor Texture set to Hard Light, and Cat Painting Texture set to Hard Light at 40% opacity. Last a couple of French Kiss Splatter brushes were added and my French Photography Overlay I created (see How to Create Personal Overlays for Your Images). That is all that was involved. Enjoy!…..Digital Lady Syd


Unexpected Humor in an Image



I was so busy trying to shoot these beautiful McCaws in sharp detail on my camera (Blue Horizons Show at SeaWorld-Orlando) that I did not notice what else I was shooting. What a surprise! Although I must say I did a pretty good job of catching the birds while they were zipping by pretty fast. The birds even look like they are laughing!

After basic processing in Lightroom, I decided the image needed a soft background feel as it was really busy and the birds were getting lost in the background. So I went back to one of my all time favorite filters, Nik Color Efex Pro 4‘s Film Efex-Vintage, to get the look I liked. First the Darken/Lighten Center filter and Brilliance/Warmth filter were applied – both of these filters I use a lot as they always give nice results. But one of my very favorites is the Film Efex-Vintage filter – there are so many options with this one filter that it is amazing. This time Film Type 11 was chosen with the vignette turned off. It turned this image into these beautiful brown tones. Clean up, a Curves Adjustment Layer to add just a little contrast, a Photo Adjustment Layer set to Cooling Filter 80 at 43% density (applied to just the birds by filling the layer to black and painting back in the birds in white), Noiseware‘s Default preset, and a soft painted layer was used to slightly soften the trapeze artist. My Soft Sparkle Overlay Frame was added with a Color Fill Adjustment Layer clipped to it to change the color to a dark brown. To see other results of using the Film Efex-Vintage filter, check out some of my older blog links below……Digital Lady Syd

Digital Lady Syd Related Blogs:
The New Film Efex-Vintage Filter From NIK CEP 4
Loving SeaWorld!
Hawaiian Bliss!
Nik Color Efex Pro 4 Just Does It Right!


Vintage Toy Processing


This image is of a really cute 6-year old that I met at the 39th Annual Turkey Run at the Daytona International Speedway who graciously agreed to pose for me. These vintage toys bring back a jolt from years past! Amazing you can still buy them! This image was processed in Lightroom using a Gritty Preset by Michael Rather from the True Grit Video – I use this preset a lot for this type of look. Then I increased the orange and red saturation a little to get the colors to pop. An adjustment brush set to Sharpen and Clarity was added to sharpen the lettering and detail on the toys only. In Photoshop Topaz (see sidebar for website link) photoFXlab was opened and from the Effects tab, the Retro Style I from Topaz Adjust 5 was applied. My favorite Adjustment tab brush Dynamics was increased along with the Sharpness. Then using the Masks tab, the effect was removed from the boy’s face. The layer was then set to Darken blend mode at 88% opacity. Back in Photoshop a High Pass Filter set to 8 and Soft Light blend mode was used to sharpen the photo. The last step involved adding French Kiss’s Glorious Grunge Edging free overlay with some of the lines removed in the center so as not to be distracting. The last step was using Nik Viveza2 (all time favorite plug-in) to direct the eye to the cute kid and toys. That’s it!…..Digital Lady Syd

Digital Lady Syd Related Blogs:
Trying Out Some New Techniques!
Digital Lady Syd’s Review of Topaz photoFXlab v1.1
Using photoFXlab v1.1
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