Weather being unpleasant lately, I have been spending considerable time in Photoshop. I am by no means accomplished, so a good deal of my time is being devoted to tutorials. I am amazed at the design tools available for special effects. I think someone with strong Photoshop skills could publish remarkable imagery using only stock photos and special effects - forget about a camera. I am sure some do.

Much of the work I am doing at the moment involves photographing historic sites in Fredericksburg and publishing them with a little story. I think many of the historic sites show better if they have a sketched or painted look, rather than a razor sharp appearance. I am far more accustomed to producing the latter. The amount of sophistication that can be applied to an image to make it appear a painting is limitless. Real artists can make this stuff look ..... well, real - this old engineer, not so much. I have posted the result below. It was made from a photograph of sail boats in a marina in Herrington Harbor, Maryland. This is a quick & dirty, first-cut attempt.

Best of all is, it works well with images that aren't really great. Although in this case, I started from a technically strong image, low resolution, shallow depth of field, and a little image blur aren't problems. In fact, most simulated water colors are blurred buy design before beginning the process. Admittedly, this image isn't ready for "prime time", but for me, the process shows promise. So If any artists happen to stumble over this post, this image is presented with my compliments for your amusement.

For those who have a copy of Photoshop, give this a try on some over cropped or maybe blurred images you thought were goners.