Life as seen through my iPhone camera.
Happy Halloween! Today's picture was drawn first in TypeDrawing (with the word 'pumpkin'.) I wasn't all that pleased with the final result even though I do love TypeDrawing, so I applied the Oil filter to it in Corel's Paint It! Now. Even though I tried to make him look like a happy skull I feel he's still a bit apprehensive looking. Poor guy.
Give him a click to see him full sized.
On a weekend drive through the beautiful Ontario countryside we stopped in Erinsville to pick up a snack for Essie. While Andrew went to buy it I took Essie down to the lakeside to throw stones in the water and she loved it. She was shivering with the cold and still howled when we took her back to the car.
The picture was taken with Gorillacam and then I used one of Snapseed's drama filters on it. Those are my favourite Snapseed filters in case you hadn't already guessed.
As always click to see it at full size.
This colorful skull was drawn in black and white using the Jackson Pollock app. I like the way pictures look when they're being drawn but when they're saved they get pretty square and blocky looking so I've been experimenting with using filters from Corel's Paint It! Now app. I used the Illustration filter on this one, then thought it needed some colour so imported it to Adobe Photoshop Express and used a rainbow filter on it.
I was pretty pleased with how he turned out in the end. I love skulls! Make sure to click him to see him at full size.
Today's skull took a lot of processing to get it to where I like it. Usually when I have a drawing that I'm not entirely satisfied with I run it through the Oil filter in Corel's Paint It! Now and that's exactly what I did with this one... eventually. First, however, I drew the original picture using a somewhat silly app called Glitterati. To be fair; it really is like drawing a picture with glitter. The finished product spangles and twinkles just like actual glitterized photos you see around the internet and you can change the size and colour of the glitter you use.
So I drew this skull using the app, not really intending for it to be something I'd use for Art On My iPhone. I really liked the finished product, though, except for the fact that when you save a picture it stops glittering. That's not a problem since I'm not really all about the glitter; it just looks kind of rough and not exactly what I wanted. So I used the Illustration filter in Corel's Paint It! Now and it was closer to what I wanted. Then I couldn't help myself and ran it through the Oil filter and voila! I loved the final result.
Oh Oil filter. Why can't I quit you? Click to see the skull at full size.
P.S. For reference this is what the original Glitterati picture looked like:
I was experimenting with nighttime photography when I accidentally took this shot with flash of a wilting rose on the rosebush in front of my mom's house. The flash highlighted the raindrops beautifully and with the application of one of Snapseed's Drama filters it really did become dramatic.
I've been amazed at how stubborn so much of the foliage is this fall. Maybe it is every fall and this is just the first time I've really noticed since I've been keeping my eyes open for new photos but the persistence of blooms and growth even in the chill is pretty awe-inspiring.
Click the photo for the larger photo, of course.
The last of the tomatoes in my mom's garden have been trying to ripen up despite being abandoned to the colder weather. This one fell off the vine and is obviously very, very dissatisfied with the way things have ended for him.
I used Gorillacam as usual to take the picture, choosing the best of three after using the three-shot burst. Then I imported it to Snapseed and used one of the Drama filters on it. I really loved the angry eyes it was making at the camera!
Click the picture to see it in its full-sized fury.
I drew this skull in Meritum Paint Pro using the sci-fi tool. After I finished that I exported it to Adobe Photoshop Express and used the White Glow effect on it to lighten it up a little.
The more I use the Meritum app the more I like it. It makes drawing even the simplest things fun and challenging but the effect is always interesting, even if it wasn't exactly what I was going for.
As always; click the picture for a bigger view!
I drew this seagull using Harmonius again. It sat around for a while as a fairly small picture until I downloaded WordFoto; an interesting app that takes pictures and turns them into amazing typographic pieces. It also enlarges the picture you use which is handy when it comes to pieces produced by apps like Harmonius.
I love seagulls and like to draw them whenever I can so a few more will probably show up over the course of this project. They're so free and hardy and beautiful.
Be sure to click on the picture to see it at a larger size.
This is another iPhone wallpaper that I made for myself. I used a neat app called Fluid Monkey to create the 'tapioca' floating downward, then exported a screenshot to Snapseed where I used the Grunge Filter on it.
Fluid Monkey is not really meant to be used as an art-producing medium as it has no 'save' feature. I get around this by using screen shots, of course, and have had a lot of fun playing with all of the pre-set configurations. Basically it's an app that reproduces the effects of movement in things like gelatin, water, mud, et cetera and when you touch it paint appears and interacts with it. It has settings you can experiment with to produce some really fantastic effects.
Honeydew bubble tea is my favourite flavour. Click it to see it full size.
I started this skull in Meritum Paint Pro and finished it off in Corel's Paint It! Now with the oil filter. The combination of those two apps has become a favourite of mine and produces some very funky pieces of art.
Maybe it's the nearness of Halloween inspiring me to create skulls lately? I've always loved drawing, painting and sculpting skulls so this is no surprise. I'll very likely have at least a couple more before the end of the month.
Make sure to click the drawing to see it at full size.
My little sister Mimi surprised me the other day with this gray hematite ring after I admired one she owned. I had taken it off and set it on my computer and noticed how nice it looked against the aluminum. Later I took advantage of the light in the dining room to recreate the effect. I shot it using Gorillacam, of course, and cropped it in Adobe Photoshop Express.
I love the play of light and the colours. Plain bands like this are my favourite style and the smooth, slick quality of the ore really embodies the symbolism of the endless loop perfectly.
Make sure to click to see it at full size, of course.
I like using Gorillacam when taking shots of Essie because she moves so much. So while I was letting the app do the hard work (anti-shake and 3-shot burst) I was just making sure I was keeping Essie in the shot. When I went through and looked at them afterward I discovered that Essie had been watching a person walk by out on the sidewalk and loved this shot in particular.
I used Snapseed's Drama filter on the Dark 2 setting and liked the ominous feeling it gave the whole scene.
Like yesterday's picture this photo was altered using Corel's Paint It! Now app on the Oil setting. I've mentioned before that I don't like using these kinds of filters on photos I take. I like my photos to be strong enough on their own to not need anything beyond a crop or a bit of messing with light and colour. When I alter a photo like this it feels like cheating since I didn't put any effort into the painterly quality of the final result. It's different when I use it on something I drew since I'm altering something I actually created using a drawing program and most often drew it with the use of the filter in mind. Perhaps the distinction is ridiculous but it's how I see it!
Sometimes, though, I just don't get the photograph I want even if the pose is right. That's what happened with this photo taken at Thanksgiving. Essie looked sweet looking out the window like this but the quality of the photo was poor; kind of grainy and blurry. I loved the light in her hair, though, and so I ran it through the oil painting filter and was pleased with the result. It forgave all the sins of poor lighting and focus and gave me something I can enjoy so I should accept that faux effects definitely have their uses. Make sure to click the picture to see it at full size!
Today's picture was first drawn using the Meritum Paint Pro app. I drew it all using the cartoon and sci-fi drawing mode, then saved and imported it to Corel's Paint It! Now app where I used the oil setting.
Meritum Paint Pro is a pretty cool drawing tool once you familiarize yourself with the drawing options and settings. I find it extremely meditative to draw randomly with the force set on high and just watch the tendrils shoot around. If you set it so that the force, tilt and width are low it's pretty effective for controlling placement of lines and details but that does take a bit of the fun out of it.
Corel's Paint It! Now is another app that is intended to give photographs a painted appearance. It has five different painting options ranging from Pen and Ink to Oil. Oil is my favourite (with Impressionist running a close second) because it can do bizarre things to pictures I've drawn in other apps. In tomorrow's entry I'll be discussing my personal preferences when it comes to using filters like these ones on photos but right now I'll just say that I love messing around with my drawings in apps that do this.
At my cousin's wedding a week ago I visited the washroom only to look up at the light fixture above the sink and see a ladybug crawling around there. I regretted not having taken my iPhone in with me (although I'd had no reason to take it in; so I thought) to capture the sight.
I forgot about it after and so the next day out in the yard I was pleasantly surprised to look down and see a ladybug! It was like destiny, and so I opened Gorillacam and took a lot of shots of her in 3-shot bursts since she was moving fairly quickly. Finally she ended up at the top of a blade of grass and flew away.
In the end only one shot came out well, and I think it turned out remarkably well. I cropped it slightly in Adobe Photoshop Express and then imported it to Snapseed and used one of the Drama filters to make it pop a bit more. I have another Snapseed edit as well but I might save it for another time.
I drew this skull using TypeDrawing. It's a type illustration app that uses fonts and your own text to draw pictures. I went simple with this picture, using only black and white and the word 'skully' in Helvetica Bold to sketch it out but sometimes simple is best! The app also has a neat playback feature so you can watch the process of your artwork being drawn in front of you when you're finished.
The app is set by default to vary the size of the text by the speed with which you draw (although you can switch that off) and you can also set it to use a random typeface. It seems odd, perhaps, to draw using words but the effect can be very nice.
Be sure to click this one to see it much larger!
I admit that I might be slightly addicted to Diptic. I find all these 'tychs a very appealing way to display groups of photos and especially so when I have a hard time deciding which shots I like best.
My mom's front step has had a beautiful display of autumn-coloured flowers sitting out and I can't stop photographing them. Their colours and daisy-style are so appealing to me, and I like how they contrast with the last of the roses. There's also a little blue bloom of something in with them and all together they look gorgeous.
Make sure to click so you can see the picture at full size.
I took this picture of an old set of bird chimes in my mom's kitchen using Retro Camera. I didn't appreciate this app at first because I found that you could not import photos into it and apply the effects; you had to use the app to take the pictures. After a bit, though, I found that this forced me to put more thought into my compositions and grudgingly admitted to myself that it was a good thing.
This shot was taken using the Little Orange Box camera; one of my favourites from this surprisingly addictive free photography app. There are four other cameras included that are just as fun so if you like things like Instagram this app will give you a lot of enjoyment.
This was created using PegLight; an app that's definitely meant for fun, not great works of art. That said: I did actually pay to upgrade the app to include more colours since I do love to play around with it. Essie also enjoys it which definitely made it worth the purchase!
It's a small pic but you can still click it to get the full effect.
I took this photo using Gorillacam (a free app which apparently will no longer be updated.) I have it set for a 3-shot burst so I can choose the best of three but the anti-shake (which my shaky hands appreciate) helps to get a good shot anyhow. After choosing the shot I liked best I used the Drama filter from Snapseed to really accentuate the raindrops.
I'm surprised that I find so many things to photograph in my own backyard. Hanging out there so much over the summer with a toddler helped me to see it with different eyes, I think. Make sure to click the photo to see it at full size, of course!
One of my favourite things to do when I'm messing around with my art apps is make wallpaper for my iPhone. One of my other favourite things to do at the same time is combine effects from lots of different apps to make one piece, and I used three different apps for this one. First I used the Jackson Pollock app to paint the earth, grass, sky and clouds. Then I imported it to Snapseed and used the Grunge filter on it until I was satisfied. Finally I used Watercolor Effect to soften it up. Phew!
Watercolor Effect is really meant more for photographs but I like to use it for things I've drawn and painted. There are lots of apps you can find that transform photos into oil or watercolour paintings but used that way they're not my cup of tea.
Click the pic to see it larger!
This beautiful begonia from my mom's backyard was shot with the iPhone camera and enhanced just a bit with the Snapseed app Drama filter. This begonia plant is still blooming like crazy even in the chilly weather and will spend winter snug inside the house to keep on growing.
Click the picture to see it larger!
This bird was first drawn with SketchBook Mobile and then I imported it to Snapseed and applied the Grunge filter. SketchBook is a fantastic drawing app; just as good as Brushes which gets a lot of attention.
I liked what happened to the picture after I applied the Grunge filter. It made the bird look like cut paper and since I love doing actual cut paper art I was very pleased.
As always; click the pic to see it full sized.
This is a sentimental tetraptych of the apple tree in my mom's backyard created using Diptic once again.
This apple tree produces bajillions of apples; none of which we can eat. Oh, how my sister and I complained about this tree and its never-ending rain of small, hard apples that made it difficult to walk without turning your ankle or mow the lawn without creating chopped apple bits that tempted all the hornets. Really, though, this tree made it possible for me to hang out in the backyard with Essie all summer without burning to a crisp. Even though we lived in fear of getting hit in the head with its plentiful fruit we were grateful for the shade. And Essie never did gratify us by repeating 'stupid apples' no matter how often we tried to persuade her.
This cute turtle was drawn using the Harmonious procedural drawing app. I've loved this tool since using it on the Harmony web app years ago and was thrilled to discover an iPhone app for it. The biggest (hah) drawback is that the iPhone app produces such tiny little pictures; only 320x480. Of course you can create yourself lots of fun little pieces of art and the app is free so I can't complain too much!
I took this photo using the iPhone Camera and added the Grunge effect using Snapseed. I was very lucky to download Snapseed during a temporary free offer but I'd gladly pay the full price ($4.99) for this app. I've barely scratched the surface of it but it's fantastic for enhancing and editing photos. It has a ton of effects you can apply to photos and I also use it to add effects to drawings I've made using other apps.
Essie's solemn expression and the light in my glass of water behind her made me love this photo even before I fancied it up. Be sure to click it to see it full-sized.
I created this demonic face using the Jackson Pollock painting app by Miltos Manetas. It's a very fun app although I find the drops kind of blocky and pixelated looking after it saves, plus the saved pictures are a bit small. I've found that taking a screenshot of the completed work rather than saving it in the app improves the quality. It's lots of fun, though, and not quite as sensitive to tilting as the DrawDrip app which can be a good thing.
My six year-old nephew pronounced this one 'creepy'.
As a bonus here is a picture Essie drew using the same app. I love this one because it looks like there's a UFO flying over it all. You can set the app to paint either with random colours every time you lift your finger or with the colours of your choice so I usually set it to random for Essie and let her have at it.
I created these fireworks using DrawDrip; a surprisingly fun free app that simulates paint splashes and paintbrush drips. Depending on how you tilt your iPhone you can manipulate the 'fresh' paint to run in the direction of your choice. In fact it's quite difficult to get them to not run at all, the phone is that sensitive to the slightest tilt.
Be sure to click the picture to see it full sized!
I drew this crow using Sandpainting; an app that is one of my favourites. It really is like drawing pictures using a flow of sand, right down to it creating shading on the depth of sand if you pour a lot in one place. I'm still working to improve my technique using this app but it's lots of fun.
Be sure to click the picture to see it full sized!
(Edited to add) This one really needs to be clicked on since the picture loses a lot of its graininess if it's not full-sized.
The photos were taken using the camera software included with the iPhone, but it's very good and I often just use it rather than other, fancier camera apps I've downloaded. I then created a triptych of the photos I took of Essie having a fit of anger in the backyard using Diptic; a great app for creating diptychs or triptychs.
Make sure to click the picture to see it full size!
