Textures

This weekend while working in the yard I decided to aim my camera at all the textures I could find. I snapped pictures of the Spanish moss hanging in the trees, the inside of our rusty wheelbarrow and the metal roof of our shed. I continued on through the yard and into the house and even took some pictures of the different textures found in our bathroom. I have added all 20 textures that are on the left and I compiled them to a zip file you can download by clicking here.

Now you may be wondering what is the big deal about textures and how can you use them. The simplest way I know to explain using textures in editing your photographs is that texture adds that extra oomph your picture may have been lacking. Sometimes the texture is so subtle you may not notice that it is even there but you do notice when it isn't.

Here is the SOOC picture we are starting with, Barbie at the beach.

After I make all the initial adjustments that I want this is what we now see:

I added a layer mask of the Spanish moss texture :

And then I adjusted the opacity of the moss and masked off Barbie's skin so it would not take on the moss effect.

The effect is subtle but it adds a nice texture to the bland background.


~ame