I AM A DIGITAL ARTIST

FLEUR LUMINEUSE - (Circles of Light series) - © Sue O'Kieffe 2007
(Thanks to Rima Koleilat for the French lesson and assistance in naming this mandala)

I have been trained and instilled with certain artistic values. One that runs deep is that of non-appropriation, i.e. using other people's images in my artwork. When digital art was in its infancy, one of the criticisms was that people were stealing images from the web and using them as their own. Im sure that is still occurring, given how easy it is to download and save from any person's given website directly to your desktop. I think for a long time digital art was not considered a true art form. Im sure those attitudes are still prevalent in the art community. I am the only digital artist in my Art as Business group.

I remain conscious of only using images for my mandalas that I have photographed myself. Anything I have used that is not mine has been done with the permission of the photographer, and I give that person credit on my greeting cards and the labels that come with my prints. I have spent as much time this spring and summer learning to capture the light in the images I am shooting with my camera as I have in creating their portraits of light in photoshop. It is much easier to create with a good photographic source image than it is trying to heal the source image digitally.

The first time I touched a computer, before there was barely anything known as a Mac or PC, I knew I was home. It took me another 20 years, though, to really walk through the door.
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On Being an Artist: Artmaking involves skills that can be learned. The conventional wisdom is that while "craft" can be taught, "art" remains a magical gift bestowed only by the gods. Not so. In large measure becoming an artist consists of learning to accept yourself, which makes your work personal, and in following your own voice, which makes your work distinctive. Clearly, these qualities can be nurtured by others. Even talent is rarely distinguishable, over the long run, from perseverance and lots of hard work. It's true that every few years the authors encounter some beginning photography student whose first-semester prints appear as finely crafted as any Ansel Adams might have made. And it's true that a natural gift like that...returns priceless encouragement to its maker. But all that has nothing to do with artistic content. Rather it simply points up the fact that most of us (including Adams himself) had to work years to perfect our art.

~ from Art and Fear, David Bayles and Ted Orland
(Credit goes to Tammy Vitale for pointing me to this book. Merci.)

TOMORROW: A PRETTY QUICK TUTORIAL ABOUT QUICK MASKS

MANY THANKS

Earth Dance Mandala - (Earth Mysteries Series) - © Sue O'Kieffe 2007

Expressing gratitude is an expansive spiritual practice that allows the flow of life's energy to remain vibrant and alive. I wanted to take some time today to say thank you to a few people out in the blogosphere who have touched my life, influenced my thinking, assisted in my process, and gosh darn it all just made me feel good!

I think I found a link to ArtBizCoach Alyson Stanfield first @ www.theartrepreneur.com back around the beginning of the year, and I have been reading her blog and newsletter ever since. If you have never read her, I would definitely recommend checking her out. Alyson is a great resource of information for learning more about the business of art. I thought her recent post about dissecting what makes a good artist's blog especially thought provoking. Read it and find her recommendations of other artists' blogs to fall in love with. I've already subbed to a couple of them and look forward to reading their stuff!

www.artbizcoach.com
www.artbizblog.com

In accordance with the mystery of the Universe we call the world wide web, I can't remember exactly how I bumped into Tammy Vitale's blog Women, Art, Life: Weaving It All Together. Tammy is also writing about kicking her art business up another notch, as well as showing off her stunning ceramic masks, torsos and beads. She is a woman after my heart, and I enjoy reading about her journey.

My friend Judi Singleton has started a new internet venture on the Law of Attraction. If you have read The Secret or enjoyed the movie What the Bleep, you would probably enjoy her email course on this fascinating topic.

www.newsecretslawofattractions.com

And finally I want to extend a bear hug of gratitude to fellow photoshop adventurers Rima Koleilat of Maraya Galleries and Bobbie of Great Grannie's Blog for letting me know that my photoshop tutorials made sense to them and were easy to follow. Check out their artwork here and here.

CIRCLES OF LIGHT

Star Light Mandala - (Circles of Light series) - © Sue O'Kieffe 2007

I decided to continue exploring the theme of dark and light that I have been investigating in my recent mandalas. I love the richness of the dark and moody colors found in this penstemon wilcoxii I photographed and transformed into a Circle of Light. I wasn't quite satisfied with my usual plain dark background, though, but also knew I didn't want to clutter the image with a lot of extraneous detail. So I created another mandala from an image of amethyst that my friend dosmangoes photographed and has been letting me use. I like the very subtle revelation of light coming through from the dark plum-hued background.

Yesterday Rima Koleilat of Maraya Galleries asked me if I ever get tired of hearing superlatives about my work. I can't imagine anyone who doesn't like some kind of recognition. My biggest desire is that my art will calm, soothe, and inspire. It is what keeps me going on those days that are dark for me too.

DIGITAL PLAY PART 3

I am departing today from my usual topics to show you the fun I had noodling around for Rima's Digital Play Challenge #3. We started with this image from wetcanvas and were instructed to have fun. How often do we hear that in our lives anymore?



End of Summer - digital photomontage
© Sue O'Kieffe 2007
Starting image + sunflower photo I took, layer mask, filters: cutout (artistic), photocopy (sketch). I will write about layer masks on Sunday for my photoshop tips

Summer Sunset Mandala
© Sue O'Kieffe 2007
Blend of two mandalas made from the starting image and the sunflower photograph, layer mask, photocopy filter on duplicate layer of bathing beauty mandala

Solar Print - digital image
© Sue O'Kieffe 2007
Above mandala image using exclusion filter, placed on separate background with blue stroke on separate layer

I hope you will go see how all artists participating interpreted this challenge by visiting the gallery wall here!

SUMMER DAYS

Dance with Summer Light - (Circles of Light series) - © Sue O'Kieffe 2007

Shadows are lengthening and there is a chill in the air. It seems like the daffodils were just beginning to bloom, and now apple harvest is right around the corner. Two of my favorite flowers, dahlias and gladiolas are blooming in grand profusion right now. Their colors are firey and soft.

I have enjoyed the spirit of play generated by Rima's Digital Art challenges. I sent my contribution directly to Madame Curator. I want to thank Rima as well for showing us how she used Lighting Effects, which I was eager to try, and did with very subtle results in the center of this image.

In the days to come, I hope to post some short tutorials on adjustment layers and layer masks. These nondestructive methods of editing images add a new dimension of flexibility and wonderment to digital art. Stay tuned!

RIMA'S DIGITAL CHALLENGE

Rima's challenge...digitally reinterpret the above image however we like .





















LILYPAD - © Sue O'Kieffe 2007

I used Photoshop CS3 for this challenge, but I believe everything I've done here can be done using other versions. (I don't know if V6 has smart blur, Rima. I really started using PS at the CS version stage.) I knew I wanted to do two different pieces with this image, one altering the original photograph and another creating a mandala from the alteration. Lilypads always echo back to Monet for me, so I knew I wanted to create a watercolor effect. I also knew I didn't want to spend a lot of time playing with this image but enough to make for a hopefully interesting mandala. I borrowed heavily from a watercolor technique I have used before. The instructions for the technique can be found below in my steps. The only thing I did differently when creating the pen and ink layer was not invert it. So my process for this image went something like this:

• I thought the original image was a little dull, so I created a duplicate layer, set the blending mode to overlay and then merged the two layers together to create a new background image.
• Created watercolor/pen and ink image following this tutorial. Do not invert pen and ink layer. Set opacity at 32%
• Created third layer. Set foreground color to black. Use photocopy filter detail 7/darkness8. Click OK. Moved layer to top of layer stack.Set blending mode to multiply and opacity at 27%.
  
• At this point I thought the image was too dark, so I created a curves adjustment layer at the top of all the layers to lighten it.
• On the original background layer, I used the crop tool to actually increase the size of the image. This is a handy trick to know. Run the crop tool around the image, In order the increase the size of your canvas equally on all sides, hold down alt/option key, and pull out adjustment to desired amount of increase. Hit Enter key. Fill background layer with black.
• Created a new transparent layer above the black layer. Use rectangular selection tool and outline image of lilypad. Go to Edit>Stroke. Create white stroke 5 pts. Ctrl/cmd+D to delete selection outlines.
• Voila! (Hey and I think I am even remembering Mac counter part keys. Am I good or what?)

Lilypad Mandala - © Sue O'Kieffe 2007

The tutorial for making mandalas can be found at this website.

• After I created the mandala, I duplicated the layer three times. (Not necessarily in this order), first I sampled the fuschia color in the image and chose Filter>Sketch>Photocopy detail 4/darkness 7. Click OK. Set blending mode to multiply and opacity to 100%
• Second layer Filter>Artistic>Paint Daubs>Brush type Wide Sharp>Brush size 8/Sharpness 7. Click OK. Set blending mode to Normal 100%
• Third layer set blending mode to Overlay. Opacity 100%. Move third layer above second layer.
• I wanted more focus on the center of the mandala, so I used the circular selection tool. Held down alt/option key and dragged selection tool up from center to just select the center portion of the mandala. Created new layer underneath top layer, copied and pasted selection into new layer. Return foreground color to black default. Select photocopy filter using black. Set blending mode to multiply. Move this selection to top of layer stack.
• Sampled grey in mandala image for background color. Filled background layer with grey.
• Clicked on second layer image to reveal Layer Styles. Double clicked on outer glow. Clicked on color box. Sampled dark magenta in mandala. Set blending mode to Normal in Layer Style dialogue box. Adjusted glow to desired amount. Clicked OK.
• Double clicked on stroke. Sampled grey from background and created stroke 3 px/23% opacity.
• Decided I was finished. Sometimes ya just gotta.
  

This was fun. Thanks, Rima! If you want the full details on the digital art challenge, go to Rima's blog here.
(The big challenge here really was writing down all the steps. And forgive me please the ongoing shift in verb tense. Not gonna make it perfect)
EDIT: A third image can be viewed at my other blog here