Wordless Wednesday | CD Packaging

If you've checked in over the last few weeks, you have probably seen the photos I did for my sister's engagement. If you missed them, you can find them here. I was looking for some cute packaging ideas instead of just handing them a plain old CD, something that would double as a keepsake for them. 



Kristy at Life-n-Reflection offers some beautiful CD packaging downloads in her boutique. She designs and sells beautiful CD/DVD labels and cover Photoshop templates. She includes video tutorials with each one, making each label super easy to put together. 



For my sister's photo CD I used the Butterdream label and cover template. You can find this one and many others in her boutique. She also offers invitations, mini albums, printables and much more. 



I think it turned out beautifully and I was so happy to hand my sister her photos in this neat little package.





I'm getting this post out late, but we were at my daughter's high school soccer game tonight. Shouting out a big congratulations to them as they beat their biggest rival 1-0 in double overtime! If they win tomorrow night they will be conference champions 6 years in a row! Hoping for a great game tomorrow night too! 

Thanks for stopping in and Happy WW! 
xo, 
tish

Nurture Photography Autumn Challenge: Green | Week One

I am so excited to be joining Kristi of Live and Love Outloud and Rebecca of Bumbles and Light for their Nurture Photography Autumn Challenge! It begins today and continues weekly with a new prompt through November 16. I really look forward to the challenges they host each season as they truly do challenge me not only to think creatively and artistically (which doesn't come natural to me, by the way) through their different prompts each week, but also to improve on my photography skills. 



This week's prompt: GREEN. 
When I think of Autumn, I don't normally think green. Bold, glowing colors such as red, yellow and orange are more what I envision. But as I looked around, I realized there is still a lot of green just trying to hang on to its color as long as it can.



I found the leaves of wild vines still green and hanging on tightly to their branches.  



I spotted some trees that change colors later than others. 



And then I found these. The fruit of the black walnut tree. 



Inside the textured green exterior lies its fruit, the black walnut. 



I have to be honest though, while I was thrilled to find these to photograph for this challenge, they are really quite a nuisance. They fall from the trees, scatter about on the ground where they rot, turn black and get mushy and in turn, it makes mowing our yard a bit of a challenge.



But, for the sake of this challenge, let's just focus on their beauty.





I really love and look forward to these seasonal challenges and want to thank Kristi and Rebecca for the great deal of time and thought they give to each one - I especially appreciate the autumn and winter challenges that they and Alicia of Project Alicia coordinate. I am not in any respect a lover of cold weather, so when the temperatures drop, I tend to stay indoors in the warmth of my home. These challenges push me to get out of my "zone of comfort" and focus on the beauty that each season offers. 

If you want to join us, you can link up with Kristi or Rebecca. Or if you simply want to be inspired by Autumn's beauty, you can visit their blogs or the Nurture Photography Inspiration board on Pinterest where they will be showcasing some of their favorites. Hope you join us! 

Happy Autumn! 

xo, 
tish

Shades of lavender

(Credits: True Grit Texture by RH West. Grunge border bar brush by Shadowhouse Creations). 

I found these lovely lavender wildflowers in the field across from our house this morning. Their bright color stood out in the dreariness of the morning. (Its been rainy here all day). I brought them indoors and put them in this old vintage medicine bottle on my kitchen windowsill. 

When I uploaded my photos, I decided I wanted to do something special with these photos - something a little different. I decided to play around in Photoshop with some brushes. I haven't used brushes in Photoshop too much until today. I didn't really understand how to use them until this week when I started taking Kim Klassen's Essentials class. She briefly mentioned brushes in the first lesson, so I thought I would experiment a little. For those of you who don't know what brushes are, brushes work like stamps or like real paint brushes. Photoshop comes loaded with many, but you can find millions of others on the internet. Anything from old sticky tape brushes, to old handwriting, birds, trees, swirls and borders ... the list goes on and on. 

So in my photos, I applied two layers of the True Grit Texture by RH West to all three photos. I then used an old handwriting brush and grunge border bar brush from Shadowhouse Creations to give the photos a vintage/timeworn feel. I'm really pleased with how they turned out. I'm quite positive you will be seeing me doing more work with brushes in the future. 

Again, it's not wordless by any means, but happy WW anyway!! 

xo, 
tish

Summer is fading away ... | Word{ful} Wednesday

(Credits: Collage page inspired by Project Alicia. Background is Kim Klassen's Charmed Texture. Old Sticky Tape Photoshop brushes by Fuzzimo. Fonts: 1942 Report from dafont.com and Pea Alexis from Kevin & Amanda).

Back in July, I posted photos of summer flowers in Polaroid frames created by Fuzzimo and learned a little bit about digital scrapbooking.  I thought I'd create a little collage with some photos I took around our yard this week ... what's left of our summer flowers. They are becoming more spindly, dropping their petals and producing less and less. 

For me, its very difficult to let go of summer, but it seems I have little choice in the matter. Fall is being thrust upon me in all directions. Don't get me wrong, I don't hate fall by any means, but its terribly hard to say goodbye to my most favorite season of them all. But I will ... give me another few weeks and I will be embracing the Autumn season as much as the next guy. Afterall, I do have a serious weakness for boots, scarves and sweaters.






If you're like me and need a boost to get into the fall spirit, you can visit my Autumn Love Pinterest board for a little inspiration. I did click on it this morning and have to admit, I did get a tiny bit excited! ha!

Certainly not wordless, but Happy WW anyway!
xo, 
tish

Watermelons

Textured with Paint the Moon's Timeworn Texture

La Tour Eiffel - Textured

A couple summers ago, our family travelled to Europe. We spent half our trip in Rome and the second half in Paris. One of our favorite stops in Paris was the Eiffel Tower. My oldest daughter has had a love for Paris and the French culture since she was about six years old (she is now fourteen). She taught herself many French words and phrases and actually was able to help us out when we couldn't communicate exactly what we wanted during our stay.

I used two of my photos from our visit to the Eiffel Tower for my homework on Day 6 of Kim Klassen's Skinny Mini E-Course. She was teaching us about textures. 

For the first photo, she gave us a recipe. I made a copy of the background and changed the blending mode to soft light 100%. I then created another background copy and changed the blending mode to Multiply at 58%. I added her Paper Stained Light texture  and used the Multiply blending mode at 53%. I then added a second layer of her Paper Stained  Light texture with soft light at 100%. I just love the result! And don't you just love the two people laying in the grass on the bottom right of the photo? 

For my second photo, she wanted us to "add our own twist." So, I copied the background layer, added an adjustment layer and adjusted the levels. I added a layer of Kim Klassen's Paper Stained texture at 46% opacity. I then added a second layer of her Paper Stained Light texture set to 100% soft light blend mode. Lastly, I added the text, "C'est si bon!" which means "It is so good!" 

I'm learning all kinds of new little tips and tricks I hadn't known about. If you need to brush up on Photoshop tools or you need a good starting point, this is the perfect course!

xoxo, 

tish

Kim Klassen's Skinny Mini E-Course

A few weeks ago, I signed up to take Kim Klassen's Skinny Mini E-Course. It is a free two-week mini course in Photoshop. We just wrapped up week I. If you've been reading my blog, you'll know that I have been playing around and learning Photoshop for a few months now. Despite that, I have learned many new things in the short period of time since we started this eCourse such as becoming more familiar with blend modes, using blend modes with text, using the color drop tool and saving photos for web.

The two photos above were part of my homework for Thursday. She wanted us to apply the soft light blend mode to two photos, apply any adjustment layer to enhance the photos and add text, using black on the lighter photo and white on a darker photo. I then changed the blend mode on the text to soft light. After that, I saved my image as a .psd file in case I wanted to come back later and work with the layers. Then I saved the images for web, which I never knew how to do before. This actually saved me an extra step as I uploaded them here to post to my blog.

This is such a great introduction to Photoshop and I'm really enjoying being a part of it as well as connecting with other bloggers and Photoshop users. She offers a more in depth class, The Essentials - Instant Access and Self-Paced - and it is only $59 for August only. If it's something you might be interested in, click here to head on over to her site for more information. Or you can click on the Skinny Mini button on my blog's side bar. You can find other courses she offers on her site as well.

It appears that the Skinny Mini is still open if you want to register and take part! 

I am linking up with Shoot.Edit.Submit at Mom Tried It and Favorite Photo Friday over at The Long Road to China. Stop over to their sites to see some more fantastic photos! 

Thanks for stopping by. Hope you are all having a great weekend! 
-tish xoxo

Wordful Wednesday | Fun in Photoshop

It's been awhile since I've taken my camera out this summer or had even had time to play around in Photoshop. Last week while the girls were away, I finally got a chance to learn a few new tricks. Awhile back, Alicia of Project Alicia posted a great tutorial on How to Fake Polaroids and using Polaroid frames. I've also been enjoying her posts this summer as she has been creating a digital scrapbook of all her family's summer activities. And though I'm jealous of those who can sit down and create amazing scrapbooks out of paper and printed photos, I'm not one who can take the time to make this happen. So the idea of creating a few scrapbook pages in Photoshop and printing them out into a book appeals to me.



So I started with downloading Polaroid frames from fuzzimo.  They download as JPEGs which means you cannot insert a photo into them in Photoshop (they need to be a png or psd file) so I followed Alicia's tutorial on How to Create a Clipping Mask. It was fairly easy and you get beautifully framed photos - perfect for scrapbooking! 



I enjoy shooting summer flowers and then looking back at them in the depths of the winter. It brings me joy and gives me hope as I look forward its end. 



I think I'll make a little book that I can keep handy for some of those cold, dark days. Kristy of Life-n-Reflection put a cute little memory book together. You can find it in a post entitled The Inspired Notebook. It looks like a fun little DIY project that even I could handle! :D 


The Polaroid frames I used in this post are Polaroid.frame-16 by fuzzimo. In the photo above, I used two layers of the Woodlands-3 overlay by Kristy of Life-n-Reflection.



And in this last photo, I used a texture of Kristy's called Springsong to enhance my photo. Its a beautiful free download she shares on her site. 


It was so fun having some time this past week to play around with my photos. Though I'm not the craftiest of people, I am enjoying the creativity I can explore in photos and Photoshop. 


Have a happy day!
-tish xoxo