Texture Tuesday : Old Barn

I've been wanting to try my hand at iPhonography, so I used one of my Barns-of-Wisconsin pics.  First I worked it up in Photoshop Elements,  with basic edits, repairs, cropped, adding a number of textures.  Then I moved it over to my iPhone and iPad respectively, using a number of different Apps.  Let's hope the metadata gets transferred when I send them back to my laptop! (Unfortunately, the only one that sent meta-data was Waterlogue.)

My first thought was to use Waterlogue on a Red Barn, so indicative of the Wisconsin rural landscape. Yup--You can tell it's farm country even in this rendition.

Then I took the same base photo and ran it through a few other Apps, like SnapSeed and Distressed FX, PicTapGo, and 100 Cameras.    These filters in the Photo Apps are not unlike the Actions in PhotoShop.  I feel like when I find an effect I like, I could deconstruct it -- do it manually, so to speak.  Like this one :

 

It appears to have upped the contrast and downed the saturation.  Why didn't I think of that?  I think this is my favorite treatment.  It might have been in Snapseed?  I was hoping that the metadata would transfer when I saved them to my laptop, but none of that came along, and I was having too much fun to take good notes on the process.  So much of it is trial and error--playing until you see something you like enough to save.  This one makes it look more like a November sky.

Here's the photo I started with.  One from my "drive-by" series of Wisconsin Barns.  Because we were in motion, the foreground is a little blurry and out of focus.   It's an effect that works for this scene.

As an aside, I regret doing that drive-by series now.  Many barns fell down under the weight of last winter's excessive snow and extreme Polar vortex temperatures.  These barns deserved more time and attention than a sloppy drive-by photograph.   I started the series because I knew these barns would no longer be part of the WI landscape one day.  That day has come sooner than I thought.  So for Labor Day, my husband and I went for a drive around Lake Winnebago with the express notion of taking some decent barn pictures--where we actually stopped the car, and got out to shoot.   Calumet County has some magnificent barns : It is farm country, meaning people actually still make their livings off the land, and so they keep their barns in working condition.  I have quite a few new pics in the stock files now!

 

Here's the base photo I worked up in PSE, with the recipe :

Layer 1) Background image
Layer 2) Copy layer 1 - erase crappy tree and crop
Layer 3) Copy Layer 2 - Multiply blend mode at 13% opacity
Layer 4) Kim Klassen's Stained Texture - Darken at 77%
Layer 5) Kim Klassen's Partings Texture - Multiply 21%
Layer 6) Kim Klassen's Stained Texture (again) - Screen at 5%
Layer 7) Kim Klassen's Revolution Texture - Multiply at 53%

After that, I added a graduated tint in Picassa to subdue the sky.

Here are a few more versions :  Sorry, I can't tell you what app they cycled through :

 

I think it was 100 cameras with some amusing and interesting names for their filters.   I think the last one had something about ghosts in the title.   The emulsion texture layer kind of does look like ghosts floating through the image ...   It's amazing how the various textures and treatments change the mood of the image.

I've been looking at this online iPhonography class, thinking about taking it ...  but the last 2 classes I've signed up for, I haven't been good about doing the lessons for various reasons--too much content, no time, too many professionals in the class and I just can't compare my stuff with theirs [Yeah--maybe a few personal demons rearing their ugly heads here, too) ...  I'm afraid I might waste the money again ...  I did find the guy's book at my local public library.  I will study that ...  At the same time, I'm really enjoying the weekly Texture Tuesday challenges which are pretty wide open as far as what to submit.  I know enough to be productive without having to go through a lesson.  It feels good!

Sharing with  The Texture Artists FaceBook Group and Kim Klassen's Texture Tuesday.