CATURDAY ART ~ CARTOONING

 June and JuneToo "in the land of Zoolatry, the land of make believe".

🌞 CATURDAY ART 🌞

CATURDAY ART

We've always enjoyed doing montages, particularly "grid" montages.  They are not especially difficult or challenging, more so time intensive.  One begins by building around one (or two) favorite photographs and repeating/repeating - repeat again, from there.  Our program of choice is always Adobe Creative Cloud (Photoshop), but I'd think this could be done with many available art programs.  Once the main image is chosen, it is resized, smaller/larger/randomly into strips and the individual images within each strip can be color tinted, desaturated, flipped, or filtered using tools or techniques available in your art program.  Time intensive: you simply work the picture, repeating, until you have a final product that you're happy with ...

BELOW:  Left, a past image from our Art Gallery files of Dougie Dog, using two photos and primarily doing pastel color tinting.   Right, a past image of Angel Zoey, featuring her in black and white centered, surrounded the the same photo in varying tones of sepia.  These two past pictures encouraged me to try a grid montage for polka dot June for Caturday Art today.

CATURDAY ART

CATURDAY ART ~ "I Fixed It", an image created by JUNE

 Late one afternoon, mine Mommy went off somewhere, to do something.  
I looked around, here and there.  

And you know, it's always bothered me a bit that all around, wherever I look,
 I see photographs of all the peoples she knows ~ 
and of course, some artwork-kinda-things.

What I do NOT see are photographs or pictures of me!
So with my own photoshop skills 

(I watch her intently every day, learning how to do this stuff), 
I decided to fix this.
Won't she be pleasantly surprised when she comes home!

HERE: A photograph of me watching mine Mommy watching me.

AND NOW: The same photograph after I fixed it!

I think I did a rather good job.

It's definitely an improvement for our little studio apartment.

Do you think she will like it when she comes home and sees it?

JOINING MY FRIENDS AT

CATURDAY ART

CATURDAY ART ~ REVISITED

Revisiting Caturday Art images from the past, 

working with shadows and satin tools

in sepia and diluted black and white.

 

DON'T GO IN THE WATER!

SHARK WEEK!

And so it begins ~ tomorrow, Sunday, July 7

hosted by our adorable pup friends ~ 

"sharkettes Sunny and Rosy" of

THE LLB LIFE

for none do it better!

Don't go in the water, 

but you can dip your paws

HERE.

Shark photo: Baltimore National Aquarium

CATURDAY ART

 

CATURDAY ART ~ SKETCHBOOK

 SKETCHBOOK

Once upon a time I'd sketch with pens and India ink, using a photograph for my subject or even a live subject before me, but now my preference is to sketch with all the wonderful tools to be found in Adobe Creative Cloud.  

The image above: LEFT, original photograph, RIGHT, final sketched image.

Both then laid onto a clip art "sketch book pad" to appear as if originally sketched there, shadowed and cropped.

To do the sketched image, many tools were used, some that I've forgotten, but basically first step was to silhouette (outline) June from the background, quite easy as the background was a solid tone, done through masking and a magic wand tool, plus a little eraser clean up.  Next: convert image to black and white, desaturate.  Next step: use different pen and sharpen tools to intensify her furs, and/or erase some furs, highlight others; add a small amount of "noise" (very small dots) onto her nose; soften/blur inner ears; erase tool for more white space around chin, cheek and neck.  

All of this is kind of a "rinse and repeat" process.  If it looks acceptable, the layered PSD file will be saved; if not, there is a "undo" command and one can try again.  The layers can be saved as separate images to work on later, add or not add depending on whether you like them or not.  

I always felt there was some similarity to painting with oils or acrylics in that you could "layer" over what you had done before if you weren't happy with it.

Nearing the end of developing a black and white image with enough detail to have a sketchbook look ~ the layers can be merged and saved.  A single layer now.

Now, add color (or not).  Percentages of sepia, pinks in her ears, light sage green in her eyes ... rust and rose to the nose. Color is often applied with the "normal" tool, but here you would use the "multiply" tool (in a % of your color code) because normal applies a solid color, whereas multiply in any percentage allows all the detail of the image below to show through.  How long did this take, perhaps 2 and 1/2 to 3 hours, all of challenging fun and learning.  Most of which I forgot promptly after finishing and could not repeat.  Each time the final image is new and different from any other done before, that's the way art is, at least for me.

CATURDAY ART

CAT CLONING

CATURDAY ART

MAY THE FOURTH BE WITH YOU

obi-wan-kitty

CATURDAY ART

CATURDAY ART ~ WINDOW WHISKERS

The original photo, above, was quite dramatic on its own with detail, sharpness and lighting.

For Caturday Art "One", below, we simply did a tight crop, 

used the smart sharpen tool to further enhance June's whiskers 

and the edges of her fur.

Also the background angles were slightly "straightened" as I tend to be bothered

when objects in the background appear off-kilter, 

and my attention is drawn there, rather than to the subject.  

The background was softened and

cleaned up with the blurring tool.  All tools from Adobe Creative Cloud.

Thinking it would be fun to go a little bit further, 

this same image became Caturday Art "Two", below.  

Now with an overall sepia filter and a tighter crop.

Then the outer image was blocked out as a solid sepia frame, "cut" into sections

with hairline rules and each section was applied with a different percentage

of tone (lighter) to alter the frame.

Whether this version came out better ~ or worse ~ or just different,

well, it's said that's in the eye of the beholder! 

CATURDAY ART

brought to us each week by 

Marie and Athena, Cat Goddess Wise Kitty

 

CATURDAY ART ~ In My Easter Basket

Thank you, bunbun ~ I would've liked a few little "peeps" too!

 

CATURDAY ART

 

June, framed by cherry blossoms.

CATURDAY ART

CATURDAY ART

Repurposing a photograph to create a new and different look.

BTW: the inimitable Marjorie Dawson, of the blog Dash Kitten provided detailed
step by step instructions, with easy to follow images on the use of layers
to create and design unique and interesting images of your pets.  If you did not
get a chance to see her post earlier this week, please CLICK HERE.

Our art gallery image this week took the original below.  
Step one: a tight crop to remove unnecessary
background area, which is often only a distraction, then resize/reduce image.

Step two: the reading glasses were highlighted, copied as a layer, the base

layer converted to black and white.  

Step three:  shadow detail was added to the reading

glasses.  Various areas of the image were either slightly sharpened or

softly blurred, to draw the eyes attention to the center of the image,

and hairline rule border added.

IT AIN'T BEEN THERE BEFORE !

PUT SOMETHING IN

by Shel Silverstein, from A LIGHT IN THE ATTIC

Harper & Row 1988

Isn't this what we all do every Saturday for our Caturday Art creations?  We "put something in" ... and do our best to design and offer to our viewers and readers something "that ain't been there before"!

Often a crazy picture (pet oriented of course) to make our friends smile!  And those of you who are good with video/audio and YouTube delight us with those loony goony pet shorts that would never be as much fun as still shots.

Can't say I recall any comb-whistling (maybe one of you has that in the works?  Smol Oona I'm looking at you ...) ... but when all is said and done, whether it has been silly, sweet or beautiful ~

YOU HAVE PUT SOMETHING IN

and 

IT AIN'T BEEN THERE BEFORE!

A few of our "old put something in" art gallery images, clockwise from top left.

  (1) See the kitty in the window.  (2) It's all happening at the zoo.  

(3) My coloring book.  (4) Christmas twins.

 

CATURDAY ART ~ REVISITED

 I can feed the kitty, Grandma.

CATURDAY ART MONTAGE

Today's art is on focus and lighting.  I find it hard on occasion to tell if an image is truly well focused and sharp, both in foreground and background.  It may appear so "on camera", yet be considerably different once transferred to my computer and into Photoshop.  Sometimes I'm pleasantly surprised, sometimes not.  The same holds true for lighting as all of June's photos are shot indoors, impacted completely by day vs night, the amount of sunlight vs shadow and/or any natural lighting in the room.  All these factors can distort her fur colors and any color values around her.  The major thing I'm so thankful for is the fast-action of our newer cell phone cameras so that red-eye or blank-eye is automatically eliminated, yet even so, available lighting will show June's eyes as golden or green at any given time ~ good, because they actually are.  Back to focus now: this photo did have sharp focus, good lighting. I could zoom in, crop to tight portions of the image and it remained sharp and clear.  And that's all one could want!  No fuss, no muss, nothing else needed to pull together a little montage and lay into a muted same image background. 

CATURDAY ART ~ PILLOW TALK

 

NATIONAL DOG DAY and CATURDAY ART

 ~ celebrating my four wonderful grand dogs, the Smiling Sammies, Chewy and Fiona,
the little Cavalier King Charles, Xander, and the Lovable Lab, Dougie Dog ~

~ and for Caturday Art, a completely fictionalized image ~ The Boy, The Dog 

The base image is just a simple photograph of a retention pond in a nearby park, posterized and with color deepened.  I then found two separate images from other old photographs, one of my grandson and one of his dog (Dougie Dog).  Each of these photos were converted to grayscale and silhouetted, then each layered onto the image of the pond, and slightly shadowed, hoping to create the look that they were sitting by the pond, using Adobe Creative Cloud, with border and text.

CATURDAY ART ~ SEND ME A DREAM

 

NIGHT.  LIGHTS OUT.

Only the night light remains.

Mr. Sandman, send me a dream.

ART GALLERY ~ Kids not Kits

Art Gallery sans pets.  We are without kits today, offering only kids.  Grandkids and kids, but altered images in photoshop, as always. While also focusing on the theme in Caturday Art which is on "eyes". For years I've altered images of my young children, and the grands that followed, often turning my attention to their beautiful faces, their eyes in particular, said to be the "windows to the soul".

Montages ~ The Eyes of A Child

Thank you to Athena and Marie for sponsoring the

Caturday Art Blog Hop

CATURDAY ART plus Bonus Caturday Art

CATURDAY ART 

"CAT NOSE MONTAGE"

Above, the original image.  Below, colorized with Adobe Creative Cloud.

Today, a little "Bonus Caturday Art"

JuneToo had moved back to her shelf for a little respite, plus Lambsie Pamsie had been missing her.  But I begged for her to come back down, just for a short time ~ I really needed comfort cuddles and hugs, so come down she did.  We sat together, we moaned, we groaned.  We commiserated.  We both wore our Raven caps.  We'll now put them away til next season.  She got our little "pigskin" from the toybox.  "wanna toss a few" she asked.  "not in the mood" I quietly said.   

Last Sunday, our last chance.  

Quoth the Raven, "nevermore".