Update on Make a Mandala-Annoying Lines

How perfect is this? No annoying lines and no extra work airbrushing, thanks to, Sue O'Kieffe who has generously given us the answer to this mystery!

So simple and easy to do. It involves expanding the selection by 1 pixel. Clever woman! I am updating the original instructions to include this, so please use the updated instructions on the Make a Mandala post. Be sure to check out Sue's Photoshop Tutorial today!

Make a Mandala-Updates Are In Blue Text

I've been so inspired by Sue O'Kieffe's mandalas and have made some humble attempts at creating one of my own. Sue has generously supplied the answer to removing the dividing lines by expanding magic wand by 1 line. These instructions are updated per her valuable input. I've had several people ask me about how I make a mandala so I decided to post it here.

Template:Source:
Et voila! here is my mandala which I dedicate to Sue who says: "I think it's important to develop your own vision with the mandalas, and to follow your heart in what you create. I am learning that that is the essence of *talent*."

Thank you Frances and Debi for testing these instructions. There may be an easier way to do this, but here is what I do:

1. First save the first two images above, the first as source.jpg and the second as template.jpg.

2. Open Adobe Photoshop

3. Select the magic wand

4. Window, show info,options, tolerance 20-25, check contiguous, use all layers

5. Open template.jpg and save template as mymandala.psd

6. Open source.jpg

7. Select window, tile

8. Select mymandala window

9. Use magic wand to select the top center left slice, then select, modify, expand by 1 pixel.
   

10. Drag the slice to your source image

11. Arrange it to pick up the area that you like, edit, copy

12. Make sure your top center left slice on mymandala.psd is selected with the magic wand, then select, modify, expand by 1 pixel, paste into
    

13. Image, rotate canvas, flip horizontal

14. Repeat step 12 one time, then go to step 15

15. Image, rotate canvas, flip vertical

16. Repeat steps 12-15 one time

17. Image, rotate canvas, 90 degrees cw repeat steps 12-16

18. Close source.jpg, save changes no

19. Activate mymandala window, select background, turn off layer (remove the eye), layer,merge visible

20. Save mymandala.psd

Congratulations, you have made a mandala! To finish use your Photoshop tools and enjoy!

A very important message

U.S.A. visitors please click here to sign The Humane Society of the United States' pledge to stop animal fighting or Canadian visitors click here. This is such an important cause for the animals and for society as a whole. These faithful friends, our animals, deserve more from us! Let's pledge to never mistreat any animal!

I've been tagged!

I've been tagged by Frances where she says:
Name four places you have lived.
Four foods you like.
Four places you have been on vacation
Four places you would rather be.




1. I've lived in New Mexico, New Hampshire, Lebanon and Egypt. I was born in Mississippi. I've lived in 9 different states, in 3 different countries, and in over 100 different houses. Amazing huh?
2. I love lobster, crabs, chili rellenos, and right now with the pears ripe on my tree, pear crumble. (I'll be posting the receipe on thebluebirdcafe soon)!
3. Padre Island, Texas USA; Puerto Vallarta, Mexico;New Mexico; Well mostly I just work and stay around home.
4. My garden, Strolling on a beach, Three Rivers NM, Right here in my home sweet home, I like it here.

Debi, You have been tagged!

Wishes For Hala

Hala, I hope you had a good day today and that God continues to bless you with light, healing, courage and recovery. These flowers are some Mexican Hats from my flower garden.

What Kind Of Flower Are You?

I am a Sunflower What Flower Are You?

This was a fun quiz and honestly I thought I was a sunflower. Maybe I am!

Nice Matters and An Apple For Teacher

I am passing on both of these awards to Sue O'Kieffe Of Sacred Circle Mandalas. Sue has given so much of herself through her encouragement and Photoshop tutorials. The screen shots with annotation makes the steps so clear and easy to understand. And when she notices that I have posted a photoshopped image and stops by to make a comment it warms my heart and gives me encouragement to make yet another image. Thank you Sue!

Pale Leather Flower Photoshop Practice

Just for fun I Photoshopped these two images from my practice using Sue O'kieffe's quick mask tutorial, one using the filter sphere, and the other creating a Mandala. I think I am getting better, step by step, lesson by lesson. I love creating stuff with Photoshop. So much fun!

In answer to the questions about what flower: It is the Pale Leather Flower, or Clematis Versicolor. A very nice vine that grows in the wild on my land. Click here for further description.

Apple For Teacher Award

I am honored to receive the An Apple For Teacher Blog Award from dear Frances of A Carpet Full Of Holes Blog. This is my favorite award that Frances has designed. I love the red color and the two images with the dark background. Thank you, Frances and hugs!

Nice Matters Award

I received this wonderful Nice Matters award from Sweet Irene of Sweet Wood Talking Blog , A blogger I read daily and enjoy very much. Thank you from the bottom of my heart, Irene.

I would like to pass on this recognition to Beverly of Eleanor's Blog, Antigone of a little bit of country and Wendy of Everything Hannah. You can read about it here as well as download the award. You are very nice young people with very busy lives, but take the time to blog and comment. So, display it proudly on your blog!

Quick Mask Lesson Result

Here is the before picture:
And here is the after picture:
Following Sue O'Kieffe's tutorial on Photoshop Quick Mask, I produced this beautiful image which is what I "saw" when I took the terrible before picture. I continue to be amazed and in awe of what I can do with Photoshop and a few good lessons. So give the tutorial a try and see what you can do. They are very easy to follow and even I, who tends to scan instead of read, can follow them.

I also completed Sue's Crop Tool tutorial which was most helpful in creating a mat around the photo.
et voila:

I very much appreciate Sue taking her valuable time to create these tutorials for anyone (me) to use. It has helped me with some areas that weren't exactly intuitive in the software. The layers, the masks, etc. I can't wait for next Sunday's post. Thank you, Sue!

For Hala

Hala, I enjoyed making this card and mandala for you. I haven't met you before but I hope that these images make you smile! Here is a link to Hala's blog if you want to make her a card.

Photo Tinting - Color to Black And White

I've always loved this photo and thought I'd attempt to change a color photo of Debi into a black and white one with photo tinting using Sue's tutorial on layer masks. I think that starting with a black and white image gives a different effect; see the picture of me and my brother. I did add some grain trying to give the photo and aged look, but wished for a sepia tone option in photoshop 5.5. Afer I uploaded I could see a couple of spots I missed paint brushing out. But after all this is practice and so won't worry too much.

Taking Sue's comments to heart, I changed the color to a sepia and here is the result:
Now, I'd better get to bed or I will be in big trouble at 5:30 am anyway.

Blending Fish and Flower

I am still following Sue O'kieffe's Photoshop Tutorial on Blending Modes Part I
and enjoying every minute of it. I used two images, one of a flower and one of a fish and blended them together into one image using the tutorial, then I used crosshatch and dry brush to make it my interpretation. And not to brag on my work, but to brag on the capabilities of photoshop, it makes a very nice image don't you think?

Queen Anne's Lace

Queen Anne's Lace is one of my favorite wildflowers. I love the single red flower in the center where Queen Anne pricked her finger while making the lace. I photoshopped this image quite a lot and had to remove my blue shoes from the bottom where I got in the photo. I left a little blue, but don't think it detracts too much, do you?

Eliza Takes A Sunrise Snorkle

I followed Sue O'kieffe's Photoshop Layer Mask Tutuorial and am amazed to be able to move Eliza to a different scene. While it is not perfect, it demonstrates that even moi can do this tutorial. Thank you Sue! You are wonderful!

Iceland Stops Commercial Whaling

Public opinion did not stop Iceland from indulging in commercial whaling, but the Japanese market did. These beautiful animals will live another day, but please join the fight to stop commercial whaling worldwide by following the links on this news announcement from hsus.org.

Abstract

Did you ever take a picture by accident and later on when you upload you find some strange image that you don't remember taking? This photoshopped image was created starting with a fuzzy photo that had some nice colors. I gave it a twirl, a sphere, and some watercolor et voila!

p.s. If you are interested, the source of the last post Mandala - K was Girl Goes To Mexico :)

Mandala - K

Here is my first mandala-tile. Well, I think I should just call it a tile as it lacks certain mandala characteristics. It was an experience and a challenge creating it in Photoshop 5.5. I was like Frances and Irene, I just couldn't make heads or tails out of any web instructions. Can you guess what the source picture was?

Photograph Tinting

This is my favorite picture of me and my baby brother. As you can see it was taken in 1958. I wanted to try my hand at photo tinting via Photoshop as I once worked in a studio where I tinted photos among other things. I am happy with the way this turned out, and wasn't brother cute as a button?