I was searching google for an image of an American flag and found the one on www.apartmenttherapy.com . I decided to play around with this image just to see what I could come up with. The image to the left is the outcome. I used a layer mask as well as a supernova effect in GIMP. I personally think it turned out well. What do you think? Leave a comment.

Persistence

Our dog Bear loves to play with the Frisbee. He is the biggest dog we have being a mix of black lab and German Shepard. I have taken a few shots of him airborne which you can view in the Photostream. This is my favorite photo of him. He doesn't worry about how far away the object of his desire happens to be. He still pursues his goal. I guess we all could learn a lot from him. Leave a comment.

Black & White Water

I love using water as the subject for photos. No matter what speed it flows, it almost always makes a decent image. I decided to make this image black and white just to see how it would turn out. This particular shot is a great display of the water flowing over a beaver dam. I am pleased at the outcome. What do you think? Leave a comment. 

This is my most recent work. I live out in the woods in Alabama. This photo was taken of the "burn pile" in my father-in-law's back yard. The photo is another example of the "Pleasantville Effect" I mentioned in my earlier post.

How to create the "Plesantville Effect" with GIMP

This is just one of many ways to achieve the effect. In this tutorial I will show you how I create photos with GIMP. I use GIMP because it is free and I like free things. You can also create this effect with other software such as Photoshop. So, here we go...

1. Open up the photo you want to digitally modify with GIMP.

2.  Select the Background Layer, right click and select Duplicate Layer











3.  With the Duplicate Layer selected, Click "Colors" on the menu Bar and select "Desaturate"..make sure"Lightness" is selected and hit ok.

4. Right click the Duplicate Layer and Add a Layer
Mask.Select White(Full Opacity) then press ADD.

5. Select the paintbrush with Black as the forecolor and paint where you want the color to show.

6. Save the file and Export the layers.

Simple but Professional Effect

This is just a simple Pleasantville Effect exercise made with GIMP. I call it that because the television show Pleasantville was where I first saw this effect. The process is rather simple but the outcome can be quite stunning. I will post a tutorial on how this image was created later. I have another example on my Flickr Photostream. The subject of that photo is a black and white fruit basket with red apples.

1 in a 1,000,000...or 3

This humorous photo was taken while my wife was playing with one of our dogs. The dog was completely focused on the tennis ball and oblivious to the fact that I was 3 foot in front of him. I actually snapped this shot in a series of shots. I have learned that when dealing with subjects that are difficult to shoot, the more pictures taken the greater the chance of a great shot.