Photo Art
McKaso
TM
Photography By: Steve Sullivan
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One aspect of digital photography that I just love is the ability to really experiment with an expanse of creative ideas and having software to carry out those ideas. I remember well the early arguments that digital will never exceed the capability of film, but I still jumped into the digital realm with both feet and have never looked back. I guess that is why one of my favorite photographers is Rick Sammon. Every month I look forward to his contributions to PC Photo and other magazines on the use of filters and how to step out of the ordinary. He has also started up a great site called the Plug-in Experience and I would like to take this opportunity to thank him for including my link on his site. If you get an opportunity to visit this site you should. There are links to some great photographers.
Experimenting with digital photography is a blast to say the least and there is really no right or wrong way to apply it to your work. It allows you to be as creative as you want. I have been lucky enough to have a patient spouse as this has also required some investment in software and some new toys J
Always remember if you want the best results you need to start with a sound foundation and that is a good photograph. This shouldn’t become an experiment to see if you can save a bad photograph but an experience to create a wonderful work of art that is really out of the ordinary.
Below is a photo I had taken at a local car show last summer hosted by the Route 385 Cruisers. Instead of trying to capture the entire car with a busy background I focused on an area of the car that really caught my attention. It’s a good photo by itself, but experimenting really allowed me to create a real work of art that brought it to life. Right now I’m waiting to get my print from the lab, but I choose to print it on metallic paper to really let the colors “pop”. I started in Photoshop with all the normal adjustments such as cropping and curves, but then hit it with Media Chance’s Dynamic Photo HDR. After that I took the plug-in trail with Nik’s Efex Pro 3.0 Neutral Density Filter and Glamour Glow, Refield’s Fractalius, Seim Effects Actions with Boom, Boost It & Glow Scape, Auto FX’s Mystical Lighting and Mystical Tint-Tone-Color (soft posterize, deepen tones & saturate colors), Pixel Genius’s Photokit (burn tool) and finally Image Skill’s Magic Sharpener 3. It took me several hours of hard work to create the photo I wanted, but it was a Blast!
As I have mentioned before in my site; Some will like it, Some may hate it and Some will not understand it, but you have to do it for yourself. That’s the beauty of Digital Photography.
Experimenting with digital photography is a blast to say the least and there is really no right or wrong way to apply it to your work. It allows you to be as creative as you want. I have been lucky enough to have a patient spouse as this has also required some investment in software and some new toys J
Always remember if you want the best results you need to start with a sound foundation and that is a good photograph. This shouldn’t become an experiment to see if you can save a bad photograph but an experience to create a wonderful work of art that is really out of the ordinary.
Below is a photo I had taken at a local car show last summer hosted by the Route 385 Cruisers. Instead of trying to capture the entire car with a busy background I focused on an area of the car that really caught my attention. It’s a good photo by itself, but experimenting really allowed me to create a real work of art that brought it to life. Right now I’m waiting to get my print from the lab, but I choose to print it on metallic paper to really let the colors “pop”. I started in Photoshop with all the normal adjustments such as cropping and curves, but then hit it with Media Chance’s Dynamic Photo HDR. After that I took the plug-in trail with Nik’s Efex Pro 3.0 Neutral Density Filter and Glamour Glow, Refield’s Fractalius, Seim Effects Actions with Boom, Boost It & Glow Scape, Auto FX’s Mystical Lighting and Mystical Tint-Tone-Color (soft posterize, deepen tones & saturate colors), Pixel Genius’s Photokit (burn tool) and finally Image Skill’s Magic Sharpener 3. It took me several hours of hard work to create the photo I wanted, but it was a Blast!
As I have mentioned before in my site; Some will like it, Some may hate it and Some will not understand it, but you have to do it for yourself. That’s the beauty of Digital Photography.
Good Luck & Happy Shooting :-)
