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| Can't believe it! :>) |
A fun part of the Edit Me Challenge are the photos from other parts of the country or world. It's a mini travelogue!
Our photo is from Kaylene Maalste of Australia. I love looking through her digital artwork. You can find her here!
"I am retired and live in Berri, Australia with my husband and bossy cat. I have always been interested in creating, in my early days it was playing around with beading, paper maiché, mosaics, quilting and embroidery. I always felt that I needed to focus my creativity into one if not two mediums and I have accomplished this with Art Quilts and photography. My surrounding countryside is full of many different landscapes, in fact sometimes I do not need to even leave my garden."
For this challenge I wanted to strategically arrange the composition ...
- level the horizon
- reverse the photo so the wheel was on the left - with the longer branch leading the eye to swoop left-to-right, up and across the photo
- take out a few branches to keep the focal point on the wheel
- lighten the bottom corner to also keep the focal point on the wheel
- work on bringing out contrast, to highlight wheel and pop it out from the background
- Bring out the fencing, adding more definition to the composition
Here's how my entry turned out - with an added texture:
And just for fun -
Here's before the texture, clean and clear - which shows off a water ripple above the wheel.
(Did a fish just jump? Or, Kaylene, did you throw a pebble?)
Basic Idea of Steps:
Reversed photo
Cloned out unwanted branches/reflections
Used dodge tool a little at a time to lighten bottom of photo
Curves Adjustment and Brightness/Contrast to adjust lightness
Vibrance/Saturation Adjustment
Spent time sponging, dodging, burning the wheel, foreground branches, fencing, and ripple.
Worked on burning tree water reflection
Contrast Adjustment - to lower background contrast (to pop out focal point in foreground)
Burned all shadows for more contrast
Added a texture for artsy fun, masking off foreground as needed
Added a blur to frost top and bottom of photo
Australia is a far-off wish to visit. It seems so beautifully rugged... and I love the kangaroo.
