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Posted on 28/09/11 9:41:02 PM |
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LagoDiLecco
Lombard Illuminator Posts: 41 Reply |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
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Posted on 28/09/11 10:07:28 PM |
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Artwel
Satire Supremo Posts: 607 Reply  |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
Anyone for Fungal Fancies?, ..They're freshly raked! (Click Link below for larger image) http://i1229.photobucket.com/albums/ee466/Artwel/PShop/Fungal_FanciesL.jpg  |
Posted on 28/09/11 10:43:07 PM |
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Jota120
Ingenious Inventor Posts: 2615 Reply  |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
More great images  Just a couple of comments: Diana with her satire, great. Artwel welcome and mi. Michael creates a beautiful image.... I am a bit shocked but welcomed
Some people I share our images with from here think François's is beautiful. I don't disagree, but I am just Trev |
Posted on 29/09/11 05:47:39 AM |
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Tom
Texture Technologist Posts: 402 Reply  |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
Could not resist the subject. 
Click for high res. 
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Posted on 29/09/11 08:45:38 AM |
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josephine harvatt
Gag Gadgeteer Posts: 2603 Reply  |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
A great first (?) entry Artwel, some really lovely work this week from everyone _________________ I'm not really bad - I just draw that way |
Posted on 29/09/11 1:36:54 PM |
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Artwel
Satire Supremo Posts: 607 Reply |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
Thanks Jo, I'm glad I found this forum, it looks like a lot of fun! |
Posted on 29/09/11 3:38:20 PM |
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LonnieK
Diorama Dreamer Posts: 238 Reply  |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
So many excellent entries this week! Clearly creativity is alive and well here. Kudos to all. _________________ Lonnie |
Posted on 29/09/11 3:53:10 PM |
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Artwel
Satire Supremo Posts: 607 Reply |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
Very nice scene Lonnie, love the boat, wouldn't mind living there myself! |
Posted on 30/09/11 05:58:08 AM |
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vibeke
Kreative Kiwi Posts: 2166 Reply  |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
Can't believe I didn't enter this week, this is just the kind of image I love playing with. My only excuse is that I have been busy trying to make a slide show for a sick friend. Some great entries. _________________ Perfect confidence is granted to the less talented as a consolation prize. |
Posted on 30/09/11 05:58:11 AM |
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vibeke
Kreative Kiwi Posts: 2166 Reply |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
Can't believe I didn't enter this week, this is just the kind of image I love playing with. My only excuse is that I have been busy trying to make a slide show for a sick friend. Some great entries. _________________ Perfect confidence is granted to the less talented as a consolation prize. |
Posted on 30/09/11 08:34:16 AM |
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Steve Caplin
Administrator Posts: 7052 Reply  |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
What a great week - so many fine entries. It opened with an unusually early entry from James, the fungus serving as a stool for a variety of toads - nicely chosen, but those shadows need to be hand drawn rather than Layer Effects. A fantastic animated version, with very froggy behaviour - the winking, catching the flying insect, and a great leap - perfect! A fairytale house for tooquilos's Smurfs, complete with windows and ladders for access, as well as that bright, colourful grass and sky. A fun animated version too: who's the big bad guy? A gloriously realistic image from Kathryn, placing the mushrooms in context. The colour, the lighting, the soft shadow on the tree and ground, all combine to make this look just like a single photograph. A meticulous and immaculate piece of work. I was going to say, after seeing you've only made 11 posts here, that it's time for an early title for you - but I see you've actually been here since July 2004, and in fact you took part in the second ever Friday Challenge! So it's about time... and Woodland Wonder seems appropriate for this week's entry. Very fine work, Kathryn - you should post more! A great underwater scene from Nick Curtain, with delicate lighting on the mushrooms that matches the rippling effect on the shark. A very consistent, convincing image. I've been trying to imagine the moment brewell looked at those mushrooms and thought "I know, what they really need is some singing mouths"... wherever the inspiration came from, it's a nicely achieved result! The lack of sound is clearly an advantage, as evidenced by the leprechaun. There again, where do you find a picture of a leprechaun with his hands over his ears? Or was this the inspiration for the mushrooms? A colourful image from Ben Mills, with psychedelically decorated mushrooms - I like the way the black outlines don't quite match up with the mushrooms, and there's a lighting quality here that makes them look almost metallic. Interesting work! A truly beautiful image from LonnieK, with the mushrooms as miniature houses. So much detail: the chimneys, the smoke, the boat and lantern at the bottom of the steps, the wolf in the background... most attractive. You seem to be having a spot of trouble with curving the windows around the top, though, and you aren't the only one - see the mini tutorial below. I like the muted tones of color's entry, and the starfish nestling against the side gives it a good context. Are they breathing? Those are big bubbles! Very nice work. BigVern's version of the Cottingley Fairies is rather beautiful - did you take the photograph specially for it? Great lighting, with a particularly ethereal glow. A perfect homage to the image that fooled Arthur Conan Doyle. Ingenious work from Josephine Harvatt, who has recreated in sepia a scene from Alice in Wonderland - and it looks so much like an old photograph it's uncanny. The girl, the caterpillar, the hookah all blend in seamlessly. Lovely. Jota120's mushroom is nicely nestled into those hands, although the shadow beneath them is perhaps a bit too grey. I like the little fairy on top, but is she too precariously balanced? Clever integration into a natural scene from Deborah Morley, with the finest of fishing lines just visible reaching into the water. Best of all is the giant frog behind - so much menace! Some interesting fungal headwear from Eva Roth - and they really do make rather good hats, although I'm not so sure about the brooch. As far as recreating a Vogue cover goes, it would be far more convincing without the highly textured background: it fights with the masthead in a way no magazine publisher would allow. But I do like the pink eyes. A charming night scene from GKB, with lighted windows, fireflies and lamps. Is it all rather too precariously balanced on that slope. though? I see you've had the same trouble curving the windows around the mushroom as LonnieK did - see below. I like the eyes in Jimbean's mushrooms, which give them a nicely startled look - and I especially like the fact that they're looking at the fairies. The varies themselves are individually good, but the different treatment on each one seems to break the consistency: I'd stick to the same colouring and glow for all three for a stronger result. THe uniform glow in the second entry is certainly better! Another fairy, another woodland - and michael sinclair has refrained from blowing anything up this week. Instead, it's a charming and consistent scene, with a leaping fairy and a delicately glowing ball just above her. The mushrooms are almost incidental, but nestle comfortably into the corner. A dark entry from joeysala that really repays close scrutiny. Look out for the fairy on the twig, the multiple frogs, the rat, the caterpillar and the worm, and other sundry creepy crawlies. They're all so well integrated it takes a while to spot them - and I still think I've missed a few. Very good work, with great consistency of tone and colour. Nice integration from puffin31939, with a couple of well-placed ladybirds. I think the glow on the fairy might be a bit too strong, especially on the wings: if they're going to glow like that, they need to be lit up themselves, surely? Brighten the whole fairy and it should work much better. Three fairies from maricliff, with some good integration - I like the way the blonde is blended into the grass. But I'm having trouble with the perspective of this scene: the shadow beneath the fairy on the cloud indicates she's floating somewhere in the distance, but if she's sprinkling dust onto the one at the front she really needs to be right above it. This is one of those perspective/distance problems that artists have been struggling with for centuries: see Hogarth's Satire on False Perspective for a historical viewpoint. I like the colours in the second entry, but you have the same perspective issue: the tree trunk is some distance behind the mushrooms, yet the fairy on top is sprinkling directly down onto them. A beautiful fairy from Garfield72, fitting very neatly onto the mushrooms. The transparent wings work perfectly, and the lighting is a very good match for the background. Good work. I was very entertained by LagoDiLecco's motivational poster - subtly expressed, and expertly created (the reflection is particularly fine). Excellent! A first Friday Challenge entry from Artwel, and it's a superb piece of work: the domes make perfect cakes, and the stems perfect cake stands. Terrific effect with the dome, as well, with the distortion of the tablecloth and the chair and wallpaper. The only thing that's needs attention is the shadow beneath the knife: the plate curves up at the edges, so the shadow needs to be further from the knife towards the edge of the plate. And perhaps a slight reflection of the knife in that shiny surface? But this is a very small detail: it's a beautiful entry. Welcome to the forum! We don't see many entries from Tom these days, but they're becoming more and more mystic: there are strong Buddhist overtones to this image, and the mixture of textures, glows and sparkles is quite beautiful. That hand appears to be a recurrent theme in your work, Tom! Fantastically good entries this week, so many thanks to Gordon for the inspirational image! _____________ A couple of you have had some difficulty wrapping the windows around the curved mushroom. There are several ways to approach this problem, and here's one solution. 1. Make an array of windows, all evenly spaced: 
2. Use the Spherize filter, set to Horizontal, to perform the initial distortion: 
3. Use Free Transform to shrink and rotate the windows: 
4. Switch to Image Warp mode, and use the Arch distortion to bend them to roughly the right shape: 
5. Switch to Custom, and bend the sides out so the windows wrap around: 
6. Add whatever glows and shading you like to complete the scene:  |
Posted on 30/09/11 09:57:41 AM |
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brewell
Pixel Pentagrammarian Posts: 752 Reply  |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
The mouths came first. A bit of manipulation of the elf's sleeves gave me a proper music critic.  _________________ Onward and upward! Excelsior! |
Posted on 30/09/11 09:58:31 AM |
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puffin31939
Montage Mariner Posts: 383 Reply  |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
Thanks, Steve. I have reduced the outer glow and lightened the fairy. I hope this looks better.  _________________ Man cannot change the direction of the wind but he can adjust the sails |
Posted on 30/09/11 10:33:51 AM |
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josephine harvatt
Gag Gadgeteer Posts: 2603 Reply |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
Thanks for the mini tutorial Steve! I originally intended my entry to be more colourful but as I also wanted to use a photo of the original Alice and no time to hand colour so I had to fall back on my old friend sepia to integrate the whole. Her image was also very pixellated so a combination of reticulation and add noise filters nudged the other layers visually closer. _________________ I'm not really bad - I just draw that way |
Posted on 30/09/11 11:30:49 AM |
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joeysala
Perfect Palmist Posts: 604 Reply  |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
You found them all, Steve! I gotta tell ya, I've done my fair share of critiques as an art instructor, and I'm pretty amazed by the attention you give each entry. I've gotten into the habit of examining each entry before reading your responses, and I have to admit I'm a bit rusty, and more often than not, I miss a lot of things you point out. BUT - every once in a while I see something I would have commented on. Anyway - thanks, not only for the Friday challenge, but for the opportunity for me to challenge my powers of observation. Joey |
Posted on 30/09/11 12:09:09 PM |
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marlcliff
Knight of Intrigue Posts: 171 Reply  |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
Thank you Steve for the helpful comments. I strugle with perspective as Im registered blind and have only one eye with blured vision. it was my 56th bday 29/09 and my wifebroughtme a 24inch monitor. |
Posted on 30/09/11 5:11:03 PM |
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Kathryn
Woodland Wonder Posts: 84 Reply  |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
Steve, thank you for your compliments. Yes, I did sign up when you first started your Friday Challenges back in 2004. In recent years I have hardly used Photoshop. Kudos to you and all the contributing members for keeping this forum up and running. I also see you have many books. Do you ever sleep or are you always working? Kathryn |
Posted on 30/09/11 5:30:47 PM |
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LonnieK
Diorama Dreamer Posts: 238 Reply |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
Thanks, Steve, for your critique and the very helpful mini-tut. _________________ Lonnie |
Posted on 30/09/11 5:54:58 PM |
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Artwel
Satire Supremo Posts: 607 Reply |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
Thanks Steve for the comments, and your excellent books!, This forum is exactly what I've been looking for, I only wish I'd discovered it earlier! |
Posted on 30/09/11 7:01:21 PM |
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GKB
Magical Montagist Posts: 4033 Reply  |
Re: Challenge 370: Magic mushrooms
Thanks Steve. I must say that using the spherise filter to tweak those windows never occurred to me. Nice one! So pleased that everyone seems to have had such fun with the mushrooms. Well done all. Gordon _________________ My neighbour knocked on my door at 2:30am this morning, can you believe that 2:30am?! Luckily for him I was still up playing my Bagpipes. |
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