Silkie a la Topaz Impression

I am having so much fun with my new Topaz plug in. It is my first from Topaz but I expect not my last. It is so amazingly cool. Thanks to Beckett for the suggestion that I check in to this software. I'm loving it.

So this is my friend Donna's new dog Silkie, photographed with my little Sony RX100 and processed first in DXO Optics Pro 9, a new for me raw processor that I love, and then a bit of tweaking in Lightroom. Then off to photoshop where I invoked the Topaz Impression plug in to make it look like a painting. It uses real brush strokes from real paintings and somehow morphs them to fit your photograph. So this is a photograph that really looks like a painting. It makes me chuckle when I see what I can do with the plug in. There is a nifty video that demonstrates all the sliders. Check it out. And here is the large version so you can look more closely at what it did. Such fun.

I photographed Silkie at our Palette Princess book club meeting today. It was at Donna's house and almost everybody was there. We had so much fun. And I totally love Donna's house and garden. She is an artist of design and creating such wonderful spaces in her home and in her garden. I may get around to posting more photos on Chaikins of Bellingham but it will be awhile. Helena joined me for the meeting and had a good time too.

Now Arvin and Helena are resting and I'm playing. I do love having time to fiddle with my photies. And to paint. I'm thinking about starting to do some little pieces here at home in my studio. That will be fun. I won't use photos like this one as models. I prefer working from life or from photos that aren't the best photos but do offer a good reference for something unique in paint.