The Gypsy
Digital Painting
I looked at some watercolor paintings on Google the other day. One that caught my eye was of a city street, all shades of gray with cars and pedestrians. A common and boring scene, but the artist’s colors and shadings made my eye linger. I realized that I could take a boring photograph and give it a painterly look. I decided to try.
I chose this photo:
Tea in Burma
I liked the pose, the way the woman’s eyes look up at me over her teacup. I began with saturation, hue, contrast, then Gaussian blur. Often I’d go back to these same steps, tweaking them, changing the blend mode, the opacity, etc. Finally, I drew the eyes and modified her nose.
To be fair, I do have several powerful plug-ins, Alien Skin Exposure X, all of the Nik Filters, plus Lucis Art 6.0. Lucis Art was the most important because with Lucis Art you can smooth your image and give it the flowing look of a watercolor painting. I think my picture looks more like an acrylic or oil painting now, but at one point it did look like a watercolor. Maybe I’ll show that tomorrow.