Merry, JOYful Christmas
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Tag Archives: #birds
Birds, Check. Cheerful Check, Check.
Gingham Cross
Well, mine is more of a calm check than cheerful. Haha. I seem to be in that mode. Last week I placed 966, out of 1309 entries.Thanks so much for voting! This check is getting lots of “favorites”. It’s nice to know it has appeal, and is not… bland. Votes are welcome.
Next week’s challenge design is going to be bright and bold. The theme is 1970’s throw pillows. Haha! Yikes. Avocado, harvest gold, burnt orange. Yeah, we need to bring those back.
This design was a learning experience. Woo Whoo! Love learning! I have made checks before, the hard way. This is quick, and it will be so easy to switch colors, and create a whole collection. What colors would you like to see? Christmas? Red, white and blue? Pretty pastels?
For The Birds, Yucca, Yucca, Yucca
A few days ago, the yucca was bombarded by the birds. Breakfast in the desert. I took lots of photos thinking, that may never happen again. Later that afternoon, they were back. And they brought buddies. I counted nine birds on one stalk! Yes, I took more photos. I even caught a couple beneath my window, and one was a chatty Cathy. Click any photo for a slideshow view.
“There is an unreasonable joy to be had from the observation of small birds going about their bright, oblivious business”
Grant Hutchison, The Complete Lachlan
A bird does not sing because it has an answer,
it sings because it has a song.
Maya Angelou
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Digital Play For Day 6
I worked on days 4, 5, and 6 at the same sitting. It was late, and when I ran out of some of the paint colors on my palette, I made some marks with the knife and left it to dry overnight. The first layers are below.
Coming back to it, I added more cream and more of the soft earth tone. Again with the knife. I was not successful in creating an interesting texture, so I played, and played, just filling the paper with paint.
I scanned it. and thought about cutting it down. Finding an interesting section, and cropping it into a new piece of art. Or maybe cutting into long strips, and creating a triptych.
Played some more, made moons. There was a round shape on the right that inspired me. The moons are on their own transparent layer. Clipped top and bottom to fit the canvas.
Decided they needed separation from the jumbled background layer. Added shadow shapes. I had to erase part of this shape, the moons are semi-transparent. I left them that way to show some of the texture from underneath.
I copied a section from the background layer and pasted it strategically. The moons needed separation from the areas of the same moon color in the painting. I erased as needed so the edges could not be seen, then I blurred the edges, so they were even less noticeable. This is quick and easy, for this piece of “play”. I would do it differently for a more intentional piece of art.
On the first day of painting, I taped down the papers. The second day on this one, I had already taken the tape off. It left a messy edge, that I kinda like. This all was just for color play after all. Haha.
Finally, I thought why not add some birds to the mix. Another PNG, transparent layer. I added a color overlay to the black birds, it was just too harsh. A deeper shade of the moon shadows was just right.
If you have four minutes to kill, there is a video here that talks about working with layers in Photoshop. There are several short videos that break it down. Sort of a digital collage. LOL. Yes, I am thinking of you Nelvia McGrath! And Sea Dean! Haha.