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02/28/2015 - Setting Sun

2/28/2015

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The Daily Texture for 02/28/2015
Setting Sun

Setting Sun Texture
Golden Retriever In The Setting Sun Art
Like this texture?  Buy it here for only $2.  
Commercial Use OK.
About a week ago, there was a glorious pinkish-orange setting sun here, and the colors inspired this Daily Texture.  I paired it with a photo of Miss Asia, a sweet Golden Retriever who lives down the street.  I masked out the cluttered background behind her, leaving just her body and a tiny bit of the ground she was laying on visible.  Then I duplicated the texture layer, placed it on top of everything, and set it to multiply at 50%.  This darkened things, which I liked, but it was too dark on her face and body, so I masked some of that layer off those areas.  Then I layered the texture on top again, and set it to soft light at 100% in order to pull the colors of the texture into her fur more and give the image a bit more pop of color.
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02/27/2015 - Simply Foggy

2/27/2015

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The Daily Texture for 02/27/2015
Simply Foggy

Simply Foggy Texture
Blue Dogwood Flowers
Like this texture?  Buy it here for only $2.
Commercial Use OK.
Sometimes a soft touch is all that's needed and that's specifically what I was looking for today.  I knew I wanted to pair this subtle texture with something white, so I started digging through my flower folders.  I found this delightful spray of dogwood flowers and I began to play.  First, I masked off most of the flower background, and a good part of the leaves as well, leaving the white petals and center of the flowers untouched.  {the texture was underneath this flower layer}  Then I placed a duplicate layer of the texture on top and began playing with the various layer modes.  Multiply made it too dark, overlay too bright, and hard light didn't suit me either.  So I reverted to my favorite standby, soft light, at 100%.  This brightened the flowers a bit and gave the overall image a little more blue tone.  Continuing on, I duplicated the texture layer again, and started scanning through the layer modes, ending up on HUE.  This mode changed the yellow/green colors of the center of the flowers and the leaves a glorious shade of teal blue!  Realistic...not really...but interesting and unique?  YES!  :)
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02/26/2015 - Olive Garden

2/26/2015

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The Daily Texture for 02/26/2015
Olive Garden

Olive Garden Texture
The Brussels Griffin Dog Art
Sometime I choose a texture based on the contrast in colors between the texture and my photo, and that's exactly what I did when I paired the "Olive Garden" texture with this Brussels Griffin dog.  His chestnut red fur contrasted in a beautiful way with the deep greens in today's Daily Texture.

After masking away his distracting background and placing him atop the texture, I duplicated the texture layer and set it to multiply at 100%.  I masked quite a bit of this multiply layer off his face and chest to keep them well lit as in the original photo.  I also masked a little of the multiply layer on the right side off, keeping the lovely hues of green in place from the original texture.
Like this texture?  Buy it here for only $2.  
Commercial Use OK.
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02/25/2015 - Purple Mountain Majesty

2/25/2015

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The Daily Texture for 02/25/2015
Purple Mountain Majesty

Purple Mountain Majesty Texture/Background
Over The Purple Mountains - Bald Eagle art
Like this texture/background?  Buy it here for only $2.  
Commercial Use OK.
Today, I was in the mood for purple.  Purple mountains, as a matter of fact.  I could just picture one of my eagle photos paired with it, and that's exactly what I made for today's image!  The eagle was photographed against a cloudy, white sky, so he was very easy to mask out and place on top of the mountains, which is basically all I did for this example.  On the mountain texture layer, I did lighten the left side so it wasn't so harsh against the feathers of the eagle on the left wing.  After merging the layers, I did a small brightness adjustment to the final image.  

I realize some of you might not like purple as much as I do...so I've given a couple of sample recipes below to show you how you can use this mountain texture/background by changing color tones when working with other textures.
Below is a visual example of how you can change the tones of your mountains.  I used The Empty Room and Patina to blend with Purple Mountain Majesty to achieve the results shown.  Changing color tones like this enables you to make a wide variety of art with the same background!  Experiment with it and share your results with me on The Daily Texture Facebook page ... I'd love to see what you come up with.  :)
Picture
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Recipe For a Winter Barn Scene

2/24/2015

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Like old barns in winter?  Here's how I created this winter barn scene!

Snowing At The Old Barn
Original photo:
Picture
This is the same photo I changed to an autumn scene using texture in my previous blog post.   Here I decided to keep with the tones of the original photo and turn it into a winter scene.  

Layer #1 placed on top of the barn photo:  Winter On The Hill Texture - Normal layer mode - top half of texture was masked away, leaving the "snow" on the ground level. 

Layer #2, placed on top - Here Comes Winter Texture - set to soft light at 100%.

Layer #3, placed on top - Here Comes Winter Texture - set to multiply at 30%.

Layer #4 - a snow layer from 2 Lil Owls, set to screen mode at 100%.
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02/24/2015 - Blooming Autumn

2/24/2015

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The Daily Texture for 02/24/2015
Blooming Autumn

Blooming Autumn Texture
For Today's Daily Texture, I decided to play with a landscape photo and see how this texture would transform a scene.  The original, drab, gray photo of this old barn was taken just as winter was setting in here in Tennessee.  I could have easily worked this photo into a winter scene {and I may still do that!}, but today I wanted to see how this texture could be applied to change things up.  I layered the texture on first as a multiply layer and set it to 70%.  Which looked pretty cool, but I wanted to have more brightness to indicate a sunset.  So I layered the texture on top again, and set it to overlay at 70%, which brightened things up more.  Then I decided to add some flying birds.  I like adding birds to these scenes, as it gives a sense of movement, like something is happening in the scene.  At this time of day, the birds would be very active, as they find their last bits of food and head into the deserted barn to roost for the night.  I've created a PNG file of silhouettes of flying birds {which is a free file for you to download...it's at the bottom of this post!}.  I copied and pasted the PNG file on top of my completed image as a new layer, and I resized it to be smaller.  I placed the birds in between the barn and the trees and set their layer opacity to 80% so they wouldn't be such a harsh black.  Then I selected the bottom row of flying birds from that layer and cut them out.  I pasted those cut out birds onto a new layer and placed them behind the open barn doorway, and I set their opacity a bit lower...I think it was about 60%.  This made that layer of birds appear to be more in the hazy background...as if they were further away, which they would be if they were behind the barn.
Like this texture?  Buy it here for only $2.  Commercial Use OK.
Picture
The Old Barn On A Fall Evening
Click the download link below to get the PNG file of flying birds!
flyingbirds-png2.png
File Size: 39 kb
File Type: png
Download File

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02/23/2015 - Patina

2/23/2015

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The Daily Texture for 02/23/2015
Patina

Patina Blue Green Texture
Perched Dragonfly
Like this texture?  Buy it here for only $2.
Commercial Use OK.
Today's Daily Texture "Patina" goes really well with subjects that have reddish brown and cream tones, and originally I was going to use it with one of my red tailed hawk photos.  As I was strolling through my folders looking for one to prepare, I stumbled upon this dragonfly photo from last summer.  The little fella was perched on a stick and I managed to get a really good photo of him where you can see the detail in those wispy wings.  I noticed his face had a teal blue-green color, and it dawned on me, this texture might work perfect with him!  His background was brown and nice and blurred, so there were no distractions...which to me, meant no masking.  Which is great, because masking around those wings would have been pretty intense. :)   After sharpening him up and denoising him a bit, I placed the texture on top and set it to overlay at 100%.  And that's it...I was done!  Because his background was blurred, the texture took to the photo very well.  I suppose I could have masked some of the blue texture color off the stick, but I kind of liked it, so I left it alone.
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02/22/2015 - Carter's Wheat Field In The Moonlight

2/22/2015

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The Daily Texture for 02/22/2015
Carter's Wheat Field In The Moonlight

Carter's Wheat Field In The Moonlight
You know those subjects you've photographed on bright days in harsh sunlight?  Now you can turn them into a totally different kind of look using this texture "Carter's Wheat Field In The Moonlight".  I've shown the before photos of both of these images below, so you can see what I mean.  For the little colt, I masked out his background leaving just a tiny, tiny bit of the flowers showing behind him.  I then duplicated the texture layer and placed it on top, setting it to hard light at 50%, but then I masked off most of that layer, leaving only the part around his feet and legs in place.  This helped to darken that area and tie him into the ground better.
Picture
Copper Colt In The Moonlight
For the calf, I reversed the texture because the light needed to be coming from the right side of him (look at the shadows in the original photo...the shadows by his feet are toward the left, which means the light is coming from the right).  After masking out most of his background, I placed the original texture on top and set it to multiply at 30%.  I duplicated that texture layer again, and set it to color dodge at 30% which gave him that little pop of extra brightness I felt he needed.
Picture
Black Angus Calf In the Moonlight
Like this texture?  Buy it here for only $2.  Commercial Use OK.
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02/21/2015 - Berries In The Dark

2/21/2015

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The Daily Texture for 02/21/2015
Berries In The Dark

Berries In the Dark Texture
When I created Today's Daily Texture "Berries In The Dark", I really wasn't sure what photos I would use it with.  Surprisingly, the first two photos I chose worked out very well!  I chose the Irish Setter photo because of the lovely red tones in his fur which I knew would blend well with the tones in the texture.  I masked away his background revealing the texture underneath, and then I duplicated the texture layer and placed it on top, setting it to soft light at 50%.  I desaturated that duplicate texture layer to keep the color tones in place, yet utilize the lighting change from using that soft light layer.  The dandelion was a fast one...it only took me a few minutes.  The background for the flowering weed was a blurred dark brown, and it was very easy to mask away.  I followed the same process by duplicating the texture and setting it to soft light on top, but this time I set it to only 30%.  I desaturated that as well.  I'm so thrilled with this texture, I think I'll do one more image with it today!
Like this texture?  Buy it here for only $2.  Commercial Use OK.
Catching The Breeze - Irish Setter Art
Enjoy Simplicity - Dandelion Art
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02/20/2015 - Innocent Love

2/20/2015

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The Daily Texture for 02/20/2015
Innocent Love

Innocent Love Texture
Lots To Say - Goffin's Cockatoo Art
Today's Daily Texture is filled with soft hues of brown, tan, peach, cream and a touch of gray and blue.  It ended up being the perfect texture to use with this soft, fluffy, feathered friend I met a few years ago.  After masking out his background, I placed a duplicate layer of the texture on top and set it to soft light at only 40%.  I merged the layers, and darkened the bottom edge of the image just a bit in order to bring the focus to the bird's sweet face.
Like this texture?  Buy it here for only $2.  
Commercial Use OK.
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    Recommended Tutorials on You Tube

    I have found a number of great video tutorials over the years on working with masking, layers and working with textures in photography.  These are some of the ones I've watched which I recommend:

    • Blend Modes & Masking in Paint Shop Pro

    • Photoshop Tutorial: Layers and Layer Masks for Beginners


    • Remask for Beginners by Topaz Labs

    • Remask 4 Tutorial by Topaz Labs

    •  Layer Masking in Photoshop With Textures

    • A Breakdown of Blending Modes | Photoshop Tutorial by Aaron Nace

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    •Quick Texture Masking Tutorial For Photoshop Users


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