Bonnie's Challenge: A Self-Portrait

"Every man's work, whether it be music or literature or pictures or architecture

or anything else, is always a portrait of himself."

~ Samuel Butler

"Every job is a self-portrait of the person who did it.

 Autograph your work with excellence."

~ Unknown

"The countenance is the portrait of the soul

and the eyes mark its intentions."

~ Marcus Tullious Cicero

"A man walks through life painting a portrait,
not of what he would have done, could have done or should have done,
but of what he did."
~ Unknown

I had a great time taking and playing with these shots this week.  It can be difficult to take photos of yourself but I have learned not to be too quick to delete what might at first glance seem unusable.  These all came from shots I would NEVER use for anything but photo art play.

Now I must get over to Bonnie's before the linky closes.
Come, enjoy the gallery with me. 
Be inspired.

Art of the Prophets

"Beautiful music is the art of the prophets that can calm the agitations of the soul; it is one of the most magnificent and delightful presents God has given us."

~ Martin Luther

". . .  David took the lyre and strummed a tune.  Saul got relief and felt better . . ." 1 Samuel 16:23

The optional theme for Photo Art Friday this week is "Portrait".

Last summer I was delighted to attend a concert in the park featuring Willis Taylor, the subject in my submission this week. Beautiful music in the great outdoors is truly a wondrous gift that brings people together and lets you step away from the cares and concerns of the day and just "be". Willis and his band did a set of golden oldies that got this 60-ish couple movin' and a-groovin' with total abandonment that warmed everyone's heart and lit up faces with ear to ear smiles. It was a toe tapping, finger snapping, hands clapping, sing along, spirit refreshing time that I will not soon forget.

Joining Bonnie and friends at . . .

Creativity is Spiritual

Here I am a little late to the party again but I sure did enjoy Bonnie's challenge this week for Photo Art Friday. Working primarily with textures and perhaps a single other image of our choice, we were to produce an abstract piece to hang in the gallery this week. I started out early in the week and came up with the image below fairly quickly.  It consists of a background layer of pdpa "Blank Page", a layer of pdpa "Splashes of Gold" and 2 layers of pdpa "Leafy Landscape" with one of them flipped vertically.  I do not remember the blend modes but I did make some adjustments to the brightness and contrast.  The piece sat in that state for five days before I got back to it and added the quote.  

The next two images are built upon the first with the addition of another texture layer, pdpa "Golden Bokeh". Using the "difference" blend mode the colours just popped in a delightful palette of blues and greens that I am totally smitten with.

This final image was flipped both vertically and horizontally and has an additional image layer  . . . a single tulip.  A different opacity percentage shifted the colour range in some parts of the piece but it still is clearly related to the one above .

I am very pleased with the way these all turned out.  I feel like the intensity of the colours matches the range of emotions I have experienced over these last weeks dealing with some difficult health issues and that is why the quote I chose resonates so deeply with me.  Some things are just too hard to articulate any other way and engaging in the creative process allows me to express what I don't have words for.

Hoping you all have a wonderful weekend.

Take some rest and have some fun.

Blessings, dear friends,

Andrea Dawn.

Vintage Themed Photo Art Friday

When the theme of "Vintage" was announced for this week's Photo Art Friday gallery my mind flew off in several directions at once.  Should I use photos from the 50's and 60's where vintage items would naturally be involved or should I use textures to create a vintage feel.

My first pieces are vintage Olsen kids (me and my sibs) . . .

I used 2 different filters and 1 layer of pdpa "Antique Me" at Hue 24%

 The middle child, Dallas Birk, perched on the back of a truly vintage automobile - 1942 Buick.

Next we have the rest of us.  My older sister Kari Jane is holding Martha Lorraine and I am holding her twin brother, Mark Leroy. This has always been a favourite family photo.

Comic Book filter and levels adjustment.

Later in the week some lighthouse shots I had taken came to mind and I thought they would be perfect to play with some vintage textures.  I really love how the first one turned out  . . .

Lyrics from "Lighthouse" by Phillipa Hanna
1 layer pdpa "Vintage Vellum" at Burn 77 %

I am not so sure about this one, but I enjoyed the process of trying different ideas and just being willing to not follow a formula or be too concerned about "getting it right".  It's art, right?  For me it kind of looks like something found in an old scrapbook where the writing from one page has transferred over to the photo from years of being stuck together.

2 layers of pdpa "Vintage Craquelure" and 1 layer pdpa "Signed and Sealed" at various blend modes.

I am looking forward to next week's assignment and seeing what is hanging in the gallery at Bonnie's.

Climb a Tree

This week's theme for Photo Art Friday is "Connected, Connecting, Connections".

This set of photos illustrates a number of sweet connections in my life.

My 2nd granddaughter is the little girl in the photos, so of course I have a strong emotional connection to her.  We are both 2nd born daughters and I loved to climb trees as a kid as well.

I also feel a deep connection to our Creator in the great outdoors and feel energized, inspired, renewed and rebalanced after even a short nature break.

"Climb a tree  . . . it gets you closer to heaven."

~Author Unkown

I am still learning a lot about my photo editing software and enjoy exploring all the possibilities. The photo above also makes use of Bonnie's "DreamWonder Texture".

 I sure miss the days when I could do this myself but I am known to unashamedly hug a tree and listen to its silent song.

"The trees are whispering to me, reminding me of my roots, and my reach . . . sshhhh . . . can you hear them?  Selflessly sharing their subtle song."

~ Jeb Dickerson

Linking with Bonnie & friends @

"Bamboo Dreams"

Happy Valentine's Day, dear readers.  I hope you have all shared some love today with the special people in your life.  I also must thank you all for such encouraging comments on my last post . . . I appreciate your prayers and comforting words. 

One of the pluses of not working is more time to play with photo art and the joy of discovering all that my new software can do.  This week's challenge from Bonnie at Pixel Dust Photo Art was to use the free texture "Bamboo Dreams" as one of the elements in our creation.  I came up with three different pieces which I am very pleased with. 

This little collage shows the texture and images I have used for this challenge.

First off is this piece featuring magnolia blossoms which I felt were a perfect match for an Oriental mood.  I used a Comic Book Filter on the image before applying the texture at Multiply 100%.

 This next one I forgot to write down the steps I used for the different layers but I love everything about it and feel a strong continuity of the "dream" theme.  

 Oh, how I love dragonflies!  Such vibrant colours and wings like stained glass masterpieces.  

The texture is not so obvious in this piece but is there none the less and contributes to the final product.  I applied the texture in Burn blend mode at 72% then used a lens vignette filter and made a slight curves adjustment.

Come check out the gallery for this weeks creations . . .

Tears Like Rain

This last month has been an emotional roller coaster for me what with having to quit my job due to severe anxiety and finding out two weeks after the fact that the major panic attack I had was really a heart attack.  Waves of fear and emotion have tumbled me over and over and tears have fallen like rain at the drop of a hat.  Facing one's own mortality is so very difficult even when you know that "the Lord is my Shepherd" and "my times are in His hands". 

My submission for Photo Art Friday depicts the waves of emotion that swept over me and the boy at the edge of the ocean represents me at times of deep distress.  This is where I go . . . to the ocean where I am reminded of how small I am and how big God is.  The placement of the chimes with the raindrops are like the eyes of God who sees me and has compassion on me.

Our challenge this week was to use Bonnie's "Dropped Petals" texture (below) as a background for an abstract creation to which we would add another texture and 1or 2 other elements.  I was not able to stop at 2 and wound up adding 4.

This blue-green swirl that became the waves started out as one of the maple leaf logos from the 2010 Winter Olympics which I put a twirl distort filter on. I duplicated the image about 6 or 7 times and moved them about the background. I set the opacity at Hard Light 77%.

Next came the second texture "Ephemeral".

          

I seem to have misplaced the original image that I made the "weeping eyes" from but it was from these same wind chimes.  In the Cutout Studio of my software I trimmed away all but the rings and marble and then duplicated the cutout and spaced them on the next layer.

 The boy at water's edge also went into the Cutout Studio where I trimmed away most of the water and some of the shore on the left.

Last of all I added this of image of a banana tree through a rainy window at Normal blend mode, 74%.

I found this project very challenging but am grateful that it provided an outlet for expressing some of the stuff going on in my life.  And I think that is what art is all about, don't you?

Linking with Bonnie @