TREE AMONGST GRAVES

Tree amongst graves
Originally uploaded by photoshopforartists
You are probably looking at this and thinking this is a tree in winter silhouetted against the sky - so what. There are thousands of pictures like this in flickr already. And you'd be right and I'd be thinking the same if I saw this as well. But...this was taken one very early morning with a mist rolling down the hills spilling into this graveyard where this one lone tree stood out watching over this hundreds of graves. It was a bit spooky and rather chilling so by using textures I tried to get across the eeriness and this is how I did it.

All these textures were taken from my BEST TEXTURES 2 set .
First one was:
EMERALD SHINES - overlay - 14%
SILVER SHADOW - color dodge - 97%
FADED GOLD - hard light - 79% with an adjustment layer to bring out bit of warmth in the heart of the tree.
RUSTED SLATE - overlay - 35%
WHITE OUT - linear burn - 100%

I finally duplicated the original tree layer moved it to the top of the stack, desaturated it with a hue blend mode at 51%.

I then added an adjustment curves layer and played around with the blue channel to bring out a bit of green.

Hope you like it.

You can buy the textures used in this picture by CLICKING HERE

POWER LINES IN FRANCE

Power lines in France
Originally uploaded by www.photoshopforartists.com

These are some power lines I photographed while in France. I just loved the graphic nature of the poles and line against the blue sky and wheat field. A very simple picture but it really caught my eye.
This type of shot really lends itself to a texture so couldn't wait to have a go at this one.
I started with EMERALD SHINES from my BEST TEXTURES SET 2 using overlay blend mode at 100%. Then picked FADED GOLD with color burn at 43%. I then copied that layer and used soft light at 57% and added an adjustment layer to it and just let the bottom show through.
I then added the SILVER SHADOW with screen at 11%. Then I went for BUSY JADE at overlay at 74%.
To finish it off I then went for a curves layer to boost the contrast.
And that it is.

FLOWERS IN VASE

FLOWERS IN VASE
Originally uploaded by www.photoshopforartists.com
Compared to some of the other textured pictures over the last week or so this one was by far the least complex. I only used three textures and two adjustment layers. I debated having only two texture layers as well as I wasn't sure if one of them was too heavy but in the end decided to leave it in.

My first texture was SMOKEY BOOK using vivid light blend mode at 15%. I followed this with WASHME VAIL with overlay at 57% opacity. And my final texture was SAHARA MIST and blend mode soft light at 100%.

On top of all of these was two adjustment layers. One curves to give it a bit of contrast and finally a hue/saturation layer to take away a lot of the orange colour in the image.

Hope that helps and try it for yourself. My low res textures are here in my flickr stream and the high res ones are on the website www.photoshopforartists.com
Best
You can buy the textures used in this picture by CLICKING HERE

NIKILYNN INTERVIEW.

The interview with young digital photoshop artist Nikilynn is now up. CLICK HERE to see the interview.

PARIS

Paris
Originally uploaded by www.photoshopforartists.com

A book publisher wanted a shot of Paris and this was the picture I submitted with the added textures from my BEST TEXTURES 1 AND 2 sets. There is quite a big difference from the original shot (see below) and it is quite amazing what can be done with some good textures. Follow below to how I did it.

I started off with CHURCH RED at colour blend mode at opacity of 88%.

Next was CHERRY SMOKE at multiply at 57%.

Then PLASTER DUST from my BEST TEXTURES 2 set using soft light at 41% opacity.

Lastly I used BOOKWORM JACKET using hue at 100%.

And to finish off the edges I added BORDER 7 from my new black borders set that you can see here as well as on the photoshopforartists.com website.

BOAT ON THE BEACH

Boat on beach
Originally uploaded by www.photoshopforartists.com

I photographed this boat on the beach late one summer's evening before spending the night camping on the beach.

Like all of my textured pictures so far I've got these textures from my BEST TEXTURES 1 set.

Began with MUD DUST using the screen blending mode at 100% opacity.

Next was WASHME VAIL with soft light at 58%.

Then CHURCH RED and the hard light mode at 28%.

For the last two textures I added a layer mask and brushed out the boat so it showed through a bit more.

The last layer was drain grey with soft light at 26%.

And lastly finished it off with a curves adjustment layer just to darken down the edges to create a vignette.

That's it.

RED ORCHIDS

Orchids
Originally uploaded by www.photoshopforartists.com

I took this shot at a wedding and this was one of the table decorations. I really liked the green red pink contrast - just works so well together.
Adding textures to this image was quite challenging because it is quite a busy picture and some textures don't show through so well but with 4 textures from my BEST TEXTURES 1 set it seemed to come together.

I started by copying the background layer and blurred that. To it I added an adjustment layer to unblur the main orchids in the middle but leaving the background orchids blurred.

To that I added the first texture layer which was WEATHERED BLACK with a screen blend mode and set it to 63% opacity.
To that placed MISTY SLAB on top with 100% opacity and soft light screen mode.
Then DRAIN GREY -- linear light - at 22%.

I stopped the textures and added curves layer to increase the contrast then a hue/saturation layer to calm the red down a bit and finally something was still missing so added WASHME VAIL to it at overlay blending mode at 30% and that's it.

TREES IN THE WOODS

Trees in the wood
Originally uploaded by www.photoshopforartists.com

I took this picture in Bordeaux, France on a cold February afternoon while on assignment for a magazine. The French do the regimented line of trees so well that I just couldn't pass it without pulling over a taking a picture. The difficulty was standing in the right place to get the feel of the symmetry of straight lines.

Anyway, I thought it would make a good texture picture but it took a lot longer to do that I thought it would. Don't know why but just couldn't get it to look like I wanted.

The textures for this picture all came from my BEST TEXTURES 1 set so take a look at them.

I started with GREEN GOO which is great on all pictures. I gave that a hard light blending mode at 79% opacity.
From where copied and pasted COCONUT TLE using color dodge at 48% and finally went for OUTER GALAZY at soft light dialling down the opacity to 53%

On top of these I added a few adjustment layer to boost the greens, increase the contrast and desaturate the image a bit.

Hope you like it.

POPPIES

Poppies
Originally uploaded by www.photoshopforartists.com

This shot was taken in a field in France on a job for a magazine and I thought it would make a great picture to add a texture to.
Before I started to add any textures I need to tweek the picture a bit. I first over sharpened the poppies to make them stand out and give the picture a 3D look. On top of that I boosted the red and yellows with an adjustment layer and then I added another layer filled it with blue applied a gradient on the layer mask to make just the sky blue. Now for the textures.
Started off with WASHME VAIL in overlay blend mode at 100%. To this I added a clipped hue/saturation layer and blued up the sky some more.
Next up was OUTER GALAZY using soft light at 100% opacity again.
Lastly DRAIN GREY on hard light at 100%. Because this texture showed through quite strongly I added an mask and brushed out the middle.
To finish it off a slight 's' curve to boost the contrast some more.

If you want to see the video tutorial of how this picture was put together using the textures please CLICK HERE

Buddha

Buddha
Originally uploaded by www.photoshopforartists.com

This shot of a buddha's head which I photographed in Singapore needed quite a few texture layers to get this look. These textures are all from my BEST TEXTURES 1 set. Nothing too complicated but there is 5 layers.
They start with COCONUT TILE using vivid light blending mode at 26%.
Next was GREEN DUST with colour dodge at 48%.
On top was then GREEN GOO using vivid light at 48%.
I then went for MISTA SLAB in overlay mode at 100% plus OUTER GALAZY at 100%. The last two textures had an adustment layer to cut down a bit of the green in the buddha's face and torso.
And lastly a hue saturation layer at the top just to remove more green from the face area.

If you want to buy the textures used above please CLICK HERE