Lilac Love

This Lilac still life uses a painterly texture, a vintage overlay, and Topaz Labs* filters.

Here is the original photograph straight from Lightroom.

Photo Notes

• Canon 5D MKIII
• Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L (I used 60MM)
• Tripod, Mirror Lockup, cable release
• ISO 125, f/11, .3 seconds
• I need to get a new backdrop so I just taped together some large sheets of paper for the background and table top.

The Post-Processing

• I first did a little clean up of areas where there were seams and gaps from the paper background using the clone tool and content aware in Photoshop.
• Next, I used the Topaz Labs* Clarity filter to give definition and vibrancy to the flowers overall. (I used the Clarity, Cityscape II at around 40%.)
• Then, I added the Windsong texture from the Tableaux Painterly Texture Collection. This I used with a blend mode of multiply with opacity around 50%.
• Then, I used the Topaz Labs* Impression filter. I'm not sure which I picked. It came up on Impression Workflow and I liked it and just reduced the opacity of the effect to around 25%. I also made another version at around 45% and applied that version selectively to the background using a layer mask.
• Finally, I placed the Overlay from the French Photo Studio Overlay Collection and used a clipping mask to change the color. The overlay was used with the multiply blend mode. (See this tut for changing the color on overlays.)

Resources:

Tableaux Painterly Texture Collection

French Photo Studio Vintage Overlays

* Topaz Labs Filters is an affiliate link. I get a small commission from any sales resulting from a click from this site (at no extra cost to you.) I really do love these filters. Nearly all of my own images use one of these filters. Thank you for supporting the site!