spring trilliums

It's Trillium time on the mountain, that means spring is here! This one is a drawing from a photo that I took last week at Wildwood Park. Colored in Photoshop using all the different layers of masked flower pieces. --and no Trilliums are not that yellow, but it won't print so brightly when I get around to actually printing it, but here it is rather brilliant, I hope it's enjoying itself!

Seeking to be well adjusted

Isolating the pencil drawing using threshold in adjustments, then choosing a fill with a gradient enabled me to play around with colors more before committing myself. It was actually more efficient than opening the original jpg in camera raw as I took the original illustration into photoshop.

I have always just loved cats, and kittens are great, but nothing beats a sweet old cat - sigh.

the waking of sleeping cats

Sleeping cats can be awakened by photoshop. Original drawing on tracing paper with pencil, then many layered and textured selections. Rudy, that's the name of this favored cat of all time. This is brighter and yellower than it will appear when printed. I have my monitor 20% reduced as I work on things so what I get when printed is more like what I see as I work. But here on the computer screen it's a little overpowering.

say cheese

Two photos, he smiles in one, she smiles in the other. Just stack them on different layers in photoshop and erase out the part you don't want, to reveal the one you do want. Why should a nice smile go to waste?

sometimes you feel like a nut . . . .

. . . sometimes you don't. Colored or uncolored versions of a tree that was originally drawn to be scary. Adding leaves, grass and color I hope has made it into a springtime tree awaiting growth.

the optimistic bee

I noticed a young woman's tattoo the other day, it was a bee. With a name like Melissa, that means bee, I had to ask her about it and she told me it's meaning.
This time all the work is in illustrator. I used a nice irregular border on the shapes to help give it a more organic feel.

what would you see?

So, if you were sitting in this tree, what would you be looking out at?
I created the shadow of the tree by taking the colored layer created with a mask, overlaying a new color on it and then transforming it to look like it was laying on the ground, how easy!

"I've learned", or "I've heard"?

Happiness and growth? - oh, is that my current condition? I know that journey thing, but blisters along the way are a reality. So, "I'm learning", or "I'm striving to learn", or "I've heard" are perhaps more true than "I've learned". Anyhow the reality of this lesson is worth seeking out because I'm definitely lost in the foothills, and I might as well be gleaning what there is to know, and finding the happiness that surrounds me.
On to technical notes: Original airbrushed work I did some time ago, with a new background, rearranged sections, updated coloring - the works. I love photoshop!