‘Dawn is the time when nothing breathes, the hour of silence. Everything is transfixed, only the light moves.’
Leonora Carrington, 1917-2011
British artist, surrealist painter and novelist. 
Tip: Before I introduce a new piece today I want to say a word to photographers who are interested in taking their work into the realm of the photo artist; a place of creativity, individuality, and sometimes if we’re lucky, a little magic.
The very first order of business is to become a collector- of papers, textures, elements; anything that might bring life to your piece. I literally have hundreds of papers, textures and things as well as my photos. Many textures & backgrounds can be gotten free by googling ‘free photo backgrounds.’ Free images can be found at https://creativecommons.org. When I’m looking for something new I purchase papers & kits, and one of my favorite places is https://e-scapeandscrap.net/boutique. You’ll find many sales and occasional free items, and this is a great site for scrapbookers.
Once you’ve collected images and elements the next order of business is to organize them into folders. I have folders for Papers & Textures, which I have sub-divided into categories of Colors, Edges-Frames-Overlays, Splotches, Scribbles, Scratched Surfaces, Brushes & Text, Clouds-Moon-Stars just to name a few as well as folders called Critters, Botanicals, Patterns-Graphics-Icons, and Victorian-Steampunk.
‘The Sound of Silence’ is the title of the piece I’ll be working with today, and we’ll start with the finished image and work backward.
The image begins with a gray speckled paper, which I duplicated twice putting an impressionist painting filter on one layer and an ink-watercolor filter on the other. Blend modes and opacities are shown on each.
Once the base layer is in place I add a very nice grungy gray/blue background and a sunspot.
A photo I took on the Okefenokee swamp is cropped, reversed horizontally, duplicated, and blended in luminosity mode at a 50% opacity. The duplicate is given a sketchy watercolor filter, blended in soft light mode with a 75% opacity.
Next come the flying geese and the text.
The text was blended in hard light mode at 40% opacity.
The final touches include the addition of a gorgeous blue/brown background and a starry background.
Finally the panel layer from Photoshop. The layers were not originally placed as they are here, but this is the final stacking before the image is flattened.
Have a happy week.
So cool to see this deconstructed! You should do a blog that’s just tutorials like this.
That’s the plan, the ‘new’ direction. Love you for your support and for so many other reasons!
Wow! That’s a beauty.
You’re so kind, Catherine. Thank you so much!
This is just fantastic, Deb! What a wonderful and generous idea to share how you create these masterpieces! And the one featured in this blog post is one of my favorites ever!
This is just fantastic, Deb! What a wonderful and generous idea to share how you create these masterpieces! And the one featured in this blog post is one of my favorites ever!
I favor this one too if only for the contrast of serenity & silence in this image with the many sounds and light of our actual day in the swamp. So happy that you like what I did with it!
for some reason I’ve missed your posts! I love the sound of silence! Is this a new direction?
Wonderful to hear from you, Cybele! You hadn’t missed my posts; it’s that I hadn’t written any for over a year! And, yes, I am taking a new direction..little more artistic & tutorial with a new name. Thanks so much for catching up with me!
Glad you are back!
Thanks, Cybele. Glad to be back.
Wonderful technique!! Loved the end result, first look gives the impression of a true painting 😊😊
Thanks so much! And thank you for taking the time to have a look. 🙂
A pleasure ❤❤