and this is the result. I am trying to pluck up courage to try Dunnewold, Benn and Morgan’s paper lamination with them – or probably with scans of them. Which has prompted me to put some varnish on the wood of my silk screen – how’s that for constructive procrastination? Each side will need at least three coats, and each coat needs hours to dry – and they tell you to do it in the book, so I’ve got to do it …
And here's some other art. I’ve been meaning to photograph these for a while, but never had my camera with me – and when I did the battery ran out, so I only managed part of this lively display.
These are designs by children from 2 local primary schools, decorating an underpass. [Hence the flash, for which I apologise.] The images are of local landmarks – so we have two versions of the King Alfred statue, one of ‘our’ Elizabeth Frink, one which may be the Cathedral – and I’m not sure about the unicorn …
Aren’t they great? – they cheer me up every time I walk through the underpass. I’ll photograph the rest if possible. And I promise not to apply any effects to them, unless there is one which will take out camera flare, as opposed to adding it.
Speaking of effects [how’s that for a subtle link?] FlauntR is a very glitzy site with lots of bits and bobs – which have different names, to confuse the easily confused. [Not a good idea on a site which is trying to sell you something – in this case prints of your photos.]
I don’t find the process of uploading a photo, saving it to an album and then editing it very user friendly. To use the program [and to get rid of the ads] you need to use pop up and drop down menus which you access and remove by clicking on up and down arrows – this may seem obvious to you, but it wasn’t to me! The crucial one is headed ‘Editing tools’ and is to the right of centre of the screen. It has a habit of folding itself up but comes back if you click on the down button.
Start with EditR, click on ‘Desktop’ and upload your image. It is a good idea at this stage to create a new album. Save the original in ‘My Album’ and any changed images in your new album – otherwise you end up overwriting the original, and having to upload it again, if you want to go on playing. Once you have saved your edited photo to the album you can download it to your desktop. [Or not – see PicasR below.]
Click on FlauntR, My Album and click and drag the image you want to use to the workspace. Confusingly, this is behind the pop up menu and may still show your previous image. If your image is small you won’t be able to see it there until you drop the pop up.
Is it worth all the hassle? The program does have some effects which may make it worth struggling through.
This is the mosaic effect, which looks like lots of little star stitches to me.
This is the ubiquitous Warhol effect.
Many of the effects allow little or no tuning, so if you don’t like the way it looks – tough.
However, if you click on StyleR, lots of goodies appear [amidst the dross – er - stylish frames and messages.]
This is a cropped passion flower [do you sense a little boredom creeping in?] in one of the better frames. Click on ‘Showcase’, ‘Frames and Overlays’ and ‘Blue Gradient’. Unfortunately the effects are not in alphabetical order, but you might find something even better during the search.
This is ‘Wood Grain’ in ‘Distortions and Light Effects’. . Could be quilting?
This is called ‘Colours 2’ – sorry, ‘Colors 2’ - layered sheers, perhaps, or canvas work?
The section PicasR is perhaps the most interesting – it allows you to recolour your image using the colours from a selected piece of art – but for some reason I can’t download the results in a form which allows me to show it to you …
There are other sections which I understand even if I don’t want to use them – like TextR – and some I don’t understand – like ProfilR and MobilR – and you can put your image on a magazine cover if you so wish. And you can pay FotoDsk AG – or possibly Colormailer - to print your image in lots of exciting ways. Can’t speak for the service, I haven’t availed myself of it.
If you’ve got the patience and determination to find your way round FlauntR there is some interesting stuff there – but if you only want to play with basic effects, Picnik or Fotoflexr are much easier to use and allow you to tune your images. I think I will add it to my Favourites category ‘Things to do when bored’ – as it could be fun to play around with when I’ve nothing better to do – like at 3 a.m. which is what led me to this malarkey anyway.
And thanks to Karen for her comment - which she advised me not to publish. [I do like to be gnomic.*] I have actually been thinking about that myself – but I don’t know whether I have the time or the courage … Could be fun, though!
* “Of, or relating to gnomes; Mysterious and often incomprehensible yet seemingly wise.”
en.wiktionary.org/wiki/gnomic
No comments:
Post a Comment