by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Photography |
What’s a girl do when it’s cold and rainy and she doesn’t want to go down to the studio and work? But she still wants to make some cool art. WHAT DOES SHE DO???
I don’t know what SHE does but as for moi, the answer was to pull out the iPhone and visit the app store. It’s like the dollar store only better because some stuff is free. Quite a lot of it, actually. And the rest of it’s pretty cheap.
And it’s a gold mine for all sorts of art and photo apps. Like Grungetastic by Jixi Pix Software. Grungetastic isn’t for when you want a pretty photo. It’s for when you want an interesting one. It’s for when you want scratches and textures and layers and you want them NOW, not after hours in Photoshop.
The basic app comes with three styles of grunge: Classic, Bleached and Pop. Each one can be manipulated to your heart’s content. Additional styles can be purchased through the app: Worn Pop, Worn Grunge, Gritty Grunge and Distressed. You can see samples of the last four on their website.
And it costs a whopping 99 cents. Gasp! Gonna break the bank…
As a mixed media artist I’m ALWAYS on the lookout for altered photos. Now I can make my own easily. Here are some samples I did tonight using the three that come with the app. I’m using the same photo in each so you can compare the different effects. I didn’t label which style is which. Sorry. And as for manipulation, I simply hit the ‘random’ button and let the app do the work.
I could’ve manipulated sliders but I was being lazy.
There’s not much distortion on this one, some, but not a lot. I figured you should have some idea of what the basic image was.
Little more in this one.
This was using the Pop style. Pop always has a posterized effect.
Classic Grunge?
You can manipulate borders too.
This is just a small sample of some of the effects you can get. A small sample. Oh man, I’m going to have a lot of fun with this… think IMAGE TRANSFERS!!!
Oh yeah….
by Susan Lobb Porter | Dogs, Photography |
Bean as Voldemort.
Ghost Dog
by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Arty Inspiration, Everyday Ordinary, Photography |
Inspiration strikes everywhere. Anytime. That’s why I always try to carry my camera around. Because you KNOW the one time I leave it home I miss the PERFECT shot.
Unfortunately that happens more often than I care to admit. But I’m getting better.
I live in a picturesque old gold mining town. Lots of interesting textures and buildings to photograph. But as I said up above, inspiration can come any time, anywhere. Including the sidewalk in front of a strip mall.
I look at this stuff and get so excited. Makes me want to run down to the studio and paint. The paintings will likely look nothing like the photos because that’s not what this is about. They’re for inspiration…. Color. Texture. Design. Proportion. Or all of the above. Layers and layers of oils and wax building up to the final piece.
Mystery. Depth.
That’s what makes it so exciting. That’s what makes it worth stopping traffic on the sidewalk while I whip out my camera and take pictures of the cracks.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Everyday Ordinary, Food, Photography |
I likes me my veggies. Like ’em a lot. So I spend a lot of time in the produce aisle checkin’ things out. The other day I wrote about the newest item in my holy crap! that’s amazing!!! dept. Broccoli Romanesco. Check Produce Art, Part 1 if you missed it. Because it’s cool. Really. Especially if you’re into patterns.
Today it’s all about color. About things so pretty you just want to eat them. It’s about finding beauty wherever you are–in this case, the produce dept. of the local co-op.
Winter squash. What’s your favorite way of cooking it? My friend Dieter makes a lot of butternut squash soup. I grew up with acorn squash baked with butter and brown sugar. Now that I’m all grown up I like it best with butter, a little salt and pepper. The Delicata Squash, the narrow one with yellow stripes, is easy to saute like zucchini. But it doesn’t taste like zucchini, it’s still the winter squash sweet.
Right next to the squash were the persimmons.
Fat luscious orange orbs. Then came the pears.
Gorgeous red pears that probably go by another name. Look at that pallet. I did some paintings recently using those colors. Love love love the orange and dark red combination. Not to mention the lime green zing. Oolala–another painting positively screaming to be made.
There were lots of pears. my favorite fruit for a still life. Or basic drawing lessons with charcoal. Form and volume. Light and shadow. Remind me of luscious fat bottomed women, the best kind to draw.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Everyday Ordinary, Food, Photography |
I stopped by the co-op after work today. Grabbed a couple of oranges and then whoa–did a double take.
What the heck is that???
That, my dearies, is Broccoli Romanesco. Which, according to my research, is a vegetable with an identity problem. In some parts of the world it’s considered a cabbage. In others, cauliflower. It’s not broccoli although you’d never know that from the name. I’ve never seen it before but OMG, it’s SO freakin’ GORGEOUS, don’t you think? Seriously, you CANNOT beat mother nature when it comes to cool designs.
Mother Nature obviously paid attention during geometry class. LOOK at the pattern. Just look at it. Since I didn’t pay attention during geometry–I was an art major, remember–I came home and looked it up. This is called a fractal form. If I understand this correctly, the pattern repeats itself small and smaller until the cellular structure of the material reaches it’s limits. So every little bump is identical to every other. Except smaller. That means even the tiniest bump you see has that crazy spiral pattern ad infinitum.
Makes me dizzy thinking about it.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Photography |
One day last spring, turkeys came a courtin’.
At first the girls had eyes only for dinner.
The guys, like guys everywhere, had something else in mind.
They had to show off. Strut their stuff.
Pairing up. Umm-hmmm. She chose this fella over the others ’cause she liked his car. Or something. The climax was anti-climatic. Trust me. Cause I’m not going to post photos of poultry porn. It would put you off turkey for ever.
HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!
