A couple of Photoshop Before and After’s

I wanted to show you how I spend my time when I should be cleaning. I can’t think of a creative endeavor that I enjoy more than opening up photographs using Photoshop and turning a halfway decent shot into something I love.

Today we took a quick day trip up to French Creek State Park in Elverson, PA. A short hike around the edge of Hopewell Lake put us on a cart road that turned into the Horseshoe Trail. And then we ended up at Hopewell Furnace, a National Historic Site.

More on our trip later because this post isn’t about our hike. It’s about turning a couple of photos I took today into something I’d actually want to sell.

I loved this shot I took of the bell tower at Hopewell Furnace. In my mind, I thought I knew exactly how I wanted it to look but it doesn’t always work that way. Sometimes I just dig in and I find what I was looking for in the first place. And sometimes I never find it.

Sometimes I show my husband and he makes a face, like he did with this one. “It’s ok,” he pronounced.

For the above photo, I did the following:

Crop and straighten.

Florabella’s Sweet Vintage action @54%

TRA’s Yin (darken) with a soft, big, low opacity brush (35%) to slightly darken the hill in the background.

SkeletalMess’ Ruffed Up 1, overlay @29%

Florabella’s Elysium, soft light @44%

Flypaper’s Tarte Tatin, soft light @ 100%

MCP’s Burnt Edges I @ 34%

Maybe you prefer the original. Not me, though. It was drizzling ever so slightly and everything was so gray.

~ ~ ~ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ~ ~ ~

This next one I’m calling “Run Away”. When I viewed this photo on my camera disk, it’s the first thing that came to my mind. (Now I want to watch Monty Python and the Holy Grail.)

You don't frighten us, English pig dogs. Go and boil your bottoms, you sons of a silly person. I blow my nose at you, so-called "Arthur King," you and all your silly English K-nig-hts.

Sorry about that. I just love movie lines.

For this photo, I did the following:

TRA’s Rusty Cage action @69%

SkeletalMess’ Ruffed Up 5, hard light @54%

Florabella’s Little Blue Book (warm), soft light @100%

(each texture had a layer mask added by me where I used a soft brush at a low opacity and brushed away some of the texture from the chickens and the grass around them)

The original is too blue for me. But to each his own. Run Away!

The actions and texture links are on my sidebar, with the exception of SkeletalMess, formerly known as Ghostbones. One of his free download sets is here [link]. The MCP Burnt Edges was a free sample from Jodi Friedman’s website [link]. Click on ‘Try Me’.

Now I need a nap. And I hope you’re still awake after reading all this!

Until tomorrow, my friends.

My husband and I lived in Elverson, PA before our sons were born. I’m just throwing that out there for what it’s worth.