I co-hosted a webinar with UK Photographer Gavin Phillips. He has been building Photoshop actions for creating artistic images for over twenty years. In this webinar he shares five actions and how to find and use some very up-to-the-minute new features in Photoshop 2023.
Artistic Actions in Photoshop
Watercolor image started with the watercolor action.
The image above was made starting with Gavin’s watercolor action. What I I like is the action is only a starting place for creating the image. You have plenty of room to massage the photo to make it all your own.
If you weren’t signed up for the live webinar you can watch but you won’t have a link to the special deal that Gavin put together for you. You’ll have to use this link to get it. https://fotoeffects.net/webinarspecial.html
If you have any questions give me a shout. Have fun!
PPA – Photographic Craftsman & Certified Professional Photographer
The work in these Painterly Posts are usually a bit more on the obvious painting side using the digital tools we have. Today’s artist is one I’ve been following for a while and while it is not specifically a painting style the work in my opinion transcends photography into a realm of it’s own. I’ll leave you to decide… Let me know what you think of Kelly’s work.
“I think it is easier, assuming you commit and invest in yourself to do it,” stated Kelly. Today, you can take a pretty awesome shot and even do what used to be very intense post processing on a smart phone. Kids 10 years old are producing some pretty decent images and sharing them to the world in minutues. That’s something that could have taken hours or days just 20 years ago. The challenge to me is again, how do you produce “SALIENT” images that others are not able to do or cant do alone with a smart phone. I think it is easier to become one of the millions of professionals photographers out there… but harder to separate yourself and become more relevant. Thus, to produce work that is in demand and that people find of real value,” concluded Schneider.
“I am a natural teacher. I love getting in front of others and having a positive impact on their views or knowledge on something and even more so when their eyes open and start to learn a new skill. It is a passion. If you have heard of the Keirsey-Bates temperament test, I am an ENFJ and that puts me in the Teacher idealist. (ref. https://keirsey.com/temperament/idealist-teacher/) Basically, I truly enjoy watching clients smile and even tear up when they see their final images. I also get emotional when I see smiles on a student’s face when they become AWARE that they get it… they see it… and they can do it.”
Where do you see professional photography in 10 years?
“To be frank, I think the future has two fundamental paths… and I think both will be exists. Not so good path: Photographers who are not keeping up with technology and establishing a “constantly learning” modality in their work will become part of the vast ocean of others out there struggling to find themselves in a way that gets clients to find them… in that photographer’s “purgatory” where they are good, but not SALIENT or relative enough.”
Good path: Those who have persevered. Those willing to take the leap, to accept and embrace innovation, and not just thinking that because they WERE great, they will always be great. They will survive and continue to provide a service and product that there will always be clients willing to pay for. There are multiple integrated elements in becoming and staying a relevant “SALIENT” professional photographer. From your personality in dealing with and interacting with others, to your day to day running of your business. This includes your vision and standards you set and adhere to. Only one of them is in taking the image.”
What do you enjoy most as a professional photographer?
“When I was 18 and serving in the US Navy, the process of Capturing Life’s Journey and sharing it with others…”
Born and raised in Coronado California he joined the US Navy in 1980 and served for 29 years. During his US Navy travels including 137 countries, he began “capturing” life around him. In 2010, Kelly began his pursuit of professional portraiture, growing and developing his skills in creating “salient” portraits focused on weddings portraiture and boudoir.
Over time, Schneider has become passionate about teaching others. He earned a Master’s degree in Human Systems Integration from the Navy Post Graduate School in Monterey California. He completed the Executive leadership course at both UC Berkeley and Duke University and is a MDPPA Board of Directors member for 2019.
Kelly and his wife Kalina (also a gifted photographer and active PPA member/Maryland PPA member) have been hosting workshops both in the US and in Europe. Kelly Schneider Fine Arts ksfinearts.com focuses on Boudoir and Fine Art portraiture and workshops.
Schneider is writing his first book “The Salient Portrait – the science behind it and how to achieve it” and it is a core element of all his workshops and training events. He earned the Best Portrait of the Year award in 2017 for MDPPA and Best Portrait Photographer for the State of Maryland for 2017 and 2018 and Wedding Photographer of the year for 2018 as well as earning two Fujifilm Masterpiece Awards in 2019.
Kelly is married Mrs. Kalina Schneider from Katowice Poland. Kalina and Kelly currently call Accokeek, MD home with their two kids – a beagle and a terrier!
PPA – Photographic Craftsman & Certified Professional Photographer
The work in these Painterly Posts are usually a bit more on the obvious painting side using the digital tools we have. Today’s artist is one I’ve been following for a while and while it is not specifically a painting style the work in my opinion transcends photography into a realm of it’s own. I’ll leave you to decide… Let me know what you think of Kelly’s work.
Kelly got his start while traveling in the US Navy starting a business called Captured Journeys Photography. He shares, “Initially, I knew so little about photography and anyone doing it that I was not influenced except that I wanted to get great images! After a few years, I realized that if I was ever going to really grow my game and produce good work, I needed to invest in my craft and my skills. That is when I started looking at true professionals who were masters. I realized I knew next to nothing!” Schneider notes an early influence for stepping up his game was Trey Ratcliff of Stuck in Customs fame.
A True Professional
When asked what makes a true professional photographer Kelly said, “I think being a true professional has little to do with how many hours or if it is a full-time thing. A true professional is someone who has dedicated and committed themselves with all facets of a skill or craft and invested in both time and resources to grow and develop their knowledge, skill, and ability to be recognized for their work. Being a true professional and doing it full time is another layer. It is just a measurement of how much time you are doing it, not how much of a master you are while doing it.”
KS Fine Arts Portrait
Changes in Photography
Changes in professional photography are coming fast and furious and while Kelly recognizes the single most impact in photography comes from those photographers who can leverage the changes. “The single most impacting element in learning photography (outside of the core ability to “SEE” light and render wonderful and powerful images, is the capacity to learn and use more complex and advanced technology in your photography.” According to Kelly. “Those who have a natural and gift for awesome photography will find themselves fading into the “non relevant” layers of photographers if they don’t embrace and learn how to bring new and exciting technology into their game. From the expanded things a photographer can do with such little effort with lighting and tech, is making it harder and harder to separate yourself from the over 44 million practicing photographers in the USA.
I’ll continue this post with Kelly next week when we find out why Kelly teaches other photographers his techniques and where he sees photography going in the next ten years…
Born and raised in Coronado California he joined the US Navy in 1980 and served for 29 years. During his US Navy travels including 137 countries, he began “capturing” life around him. In 2010, Kelly began his pursuit of professional portraiture, growing and developing his skills in creating “salient” portraits focused on weddings portraiture and boudoir.
Over time, Schneider has become passionate about teaching others. He earned a Master’s degree in Human Systems Integration from the Navy Post Graduate School in Monterey California. He completed the Executive leadership course at both UC Berkeley and Duke University and is a MDPPA Board of Directors member for 2019.
Kelly and his wife Kalina (also a gifted photographer and active PPA member/Maryland PPA member) have been hosting workshops both in the US and in Europe. Kelly Schneider Fine Arts ksfinearts.com focuses on Boudoir and Fine Art portraiture and workshops.
Schneider is writing his first book “The Salient Portrait – the science behind it and how to achieve it” and it is a core element of all his workshops and training events. He earned the Best Portrait of the Year award in 2017 for MDPPA and Best Portrait Photographer for the State of Maryland for 2017 and 2018 and Wedding Photographer of the year for 2018 as well as earning two Fujifilm Masterpiece Awards in 2019.
Kelly is married Mrs. Kalina Schneider from Katowice Poland. Kalina and Kelly currently call Accokeek, MD home with their two kids – a beagle and a terrier!
Tuesday Painterly Art
Michelle Parsley M.Photog, M. Artist, Cr., CPP
I had the pleasure of taking a Michelle Parsley full day Pre-Con class at Imaging USA this year. I was extremely impressed with her attention to detail and classroom style. If you ever get the opportunity to learn from Michelle, I highly recommend it. BTW, you can also work with Michelle online. Check out links to her education at the bottom of the post.
“For most of my client work, I create “pretty pictures” in either digital or traditional mediums. An example of client work would be “A Study in Pastels”.
But when I’m given free rein to do anything I want — I love to tell stories with my images. I believe storytelling is one of my artistic strengths and I find it especially satisfying when others can easily see the story. I often employ this tactic in my competition images.
Sometimes, I am compelled to tell a serious story — like in the image “Dear John”. Anyone that has served in our armed forces can easily identify with this image.
More often than not, I tell humorous stories like “Dinner and a Show”. What little one hasn’t used a pot for a drum and sang at the top of their lungs? By giving him an audience of puppies in a barn, it accurately reflects the realities of life with boys on the farm. (No — this child is not one of my boys)
In “Who’s Training Whom?” You can really get a glimpse into my imagination. I had the pleasure of visiting the old Sheldon Church ruins in the Charleston, SC area with Tiffany Briley of Charleston Photography Tours a few years back. I couldn’t help but let my imagination run wild! What a giggle it was to have Julia Kelleher photograph her son based on my directions, and create this fanciful image of a friendly dragon. The dragon was created by photographing a plastic toy from several angles and frankensteining it together in Photoshop.
Continued next week!
Behind every artist there is a story and Michelle’s story began as a child when she would draw or paint with anything she could find (which got her in trouble on more than one occasion!). She has been creating hand drawn and hand
painted art for clients for nearly 20 years. Michelle is mostly self-taught in all the mediums she uses to express
her creativity. By combining her love of both digital and organic mediums, Michelle is uniquely equipped to both create and teach art. Michelle earned her Certified Professional Photographer (CPP) designation from Professional
Photographers of America (PPA) in 2009 which led her to enter her first International
Photographic Competition in 2010.
She has since earned the Master of Photography
and Master Artist degrees in 2014, diamond artist of the year in 2012, the
Imaging Excellence Award in 2015, Photographic Craftsman in 2017, Double diamond and the Imaging Excellence Bar in 2018.
When Michelle is not teaching, photographing, or painting, she enjoys a great cup of coffee, dark chocolate, and working on the family farm in rural Tennessee where she lives with her husband of over 25 years, their four children, four dogs, and an ever changing host of farm animals.
The class I took from Michelle – Photoshop Clone Painting
More Clone Painting Classes – All Clone Painting Classes
Interpreting the Red Rocks – Juuuust a Little Different
If you have followed this blog and my work for any length of time you know that I often like to take my images further than a ‘straight’ photograph. I have found a weird thing while working on this process. There are times to get a certain look you need to make what I would normally consider a ‘bad’ photograph. One that is either under or overexposed to create the vision in your using certain textures.
Here’s a case in point. The density range for this image was huge in that I was shooting the flower in the shade and the background was in full sun. I originally bracketed this scene to get a ‘correct’ exposure. I processed that, but when I went to work, I found that I had better results with the image that was a single exposure rather than having all the detail that Aurora HDR 2018 software would provide.
Here is one of the bracketed images slightly over-exposed. Little to no detail in the sky.
The little to no detail in the sky gives the texture a chance to shine. I used texture from a small section of an old painting in various blend modes to achieve the image below.
Here is my artistic rendition of the image.
I think the plain image needed some help other than making a full range of tones visible. I work photos in many different ways before I find the vision for which I was looking.
Here is thePhotoshop Layers Palette from the image above. Note: all Layers had a different blend mode applied and Masks were used to extract or cover the information I did or didn’t want.
Lumix G9 with the Leica DG Vario-ELMARIT Professional Lens, 12-60MM, F2.8-4.0 was used for this capture. The fully articulating screen is helpful when framing an image where the camera is low to the ground. Saves getting down to try and look through the viewfinder and also save work in the laundry for clothes that have been doused in dirt!
For infrared conversion of my cameras I use LifePixel. Infrared allows you to put an older camera to use and opens up a new time time of day for productive image creation.
Fotopro tripods are well worth checking out. You can learn about the ones I use and recommend by clicking on the Fotopro Tripods link at the top of this page. If you want to see what other tripods might fit your needs check out the Fotopro.com website. Check back with me before you buy as a Fotopro Ambassador I’m able to get you discounted pricing including complementary continental USA shipping for my followers that you won’t find through retail outlets.
Learn Photoshop in a fun environment. Aaron Nace applies the right amount of fun with easy to understand and follow tutorials. Actions and brushes are included with lessons!
Lightning, waterdroplets, sound, time-lapse, HDR sequences, smiles and much more control for your camera!
Cameras Get Smarter -
A High Speed Smart Camera Remote
Best embroidery ever. Give Queensboro a try, get a $20 instant credit to get started by clicking on the logo! They specialize in great quality custom logo apparel and promotional products with the best customer service.
Platypod has become a great resource for being creative in getting your camera gear easily into unusual places. As an Platypod Pro I get to work/play with the gear even before it comes out. Head over to Platypod, subscribe to the newsletter and you will get special discounts reserved only for subscribers.
