I Love You Greeting Card

It took me several weeks to create this card. I took a photo of my hand and a crystal heart thing I have. I then combined the hand and the heart together. After that, I found the stars/landscape photo online, but mindful of copyrights, I changed the stars/landscape in different colors, light affects, and other manipulations. I also cropped the picture to only the far right side of the photo, meaning I removed the middle and left of the picture. So, it doesn't look exactly like an original photo found online at all. I then did a lot of tricks, trying to blend the heart/hand into the background, trying to make the I Love You hand stand out by adding the white on the outlines on the fingers, using Embossed, Drop Shadow, Paint, Fill Bucket tool, and a few more. It was a challenge to make it work. I then used Apple's Page software already in my iMac laptop to create a card. After adding the purple background behind the image, I added the border around the image. I then added the Nature shape (tall grass blades) and two thin lines above and below the image. Henceforth, it's done. 

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Eddie with Flame

I used an iPhone to take a photo of myself, wearing a red shirt, zebra-striped felt hat, a sunglasses, and a piano tie. I lit up a cigarette lighter in front of me, which enabled the flame-glowing affect on myself. I then manipulated the work in PicsArt app, which created the Cubism-styled shapes on my face and shirt. I then went into PhotoShop to darken the background with a black paint tool at around 50% transparency. I also blurred the background to smoothen it out a little. I had to blur myself to reduce the pixelations and sharp edges. If you look closely on the sunglasses lens, you'd notice a reflection of my iPhone in front of me. That's an interesting result.

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4 Photos Arranged Together into Tiles

Put the 4 photos of myself into PhotoShop, then arranged them together to make it become to look like this. A tile style. Each set next to each other and above and below each other. It was a challenge to fit them correctly. Though it was fun to do. 

I took a photo of myself with iPhoto, wearing a black shirt. A black cloth was hanging behind me. I then used PicsArt app to make the photo black and white and I used some effects to make the face/hand glow with high contrast, blurs, and etc. Noticing too much sharp edge on my head and the eyes/nose/mouth on my face, I had to fix it. Also, the nose nostrils were deep black, which didn't match the eyes, mouth, and eyebrows color (grey). I used PhotoShop to solve the problem by blurring the edge and filling the nostrils in grey color. This is titled "Death" and it's pretty much influenced by Robert Mapplethorpe's self-portrait with a skull on the cane, which I saw at Rochester George Eastman House several years ago. That Mapplethorpe photo really hit me and I shall never forget it. Powerful indeed!

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70's Vintage Self-Portrait

I had a photo similar to this but lost it. I finally found time to do it again with the right sunlight into the room from the window as natural light. I wore the white long sleeve shirt, untied black tie, and a black hat. I posed similar but not exact like how Patti Smith posed in her 1975 "Horses" album (photo by Robert Mapplethorpe). I then made the work into black and white in 70's vintage look and added the cracks around me as if it's an old 70's picture. Turned out interesting. I had fun with this project.

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Self-Portrait with Make-Up and Hat

Here is a new self-portrait I just created. I put the make-up on in front of the mirror, which took a while to do. Then I used my iPhone, facing myself, and I turned myself around to see what backgrounds would look like. The glowing sunlight coming from my window became my background choice. I snapped the picture of myself with that background. I then used PicsArt app and manipulated the image with effects that enhanced the quality and beauty to the work. It was a lot of fun but a lot of work. 

Enjoy the picture and you can click on it to make it bigger.

Series of Self-Portrait with iPhone

For a while, I have been doing self-portraits, just by using an iPhone. I have been going beyond just regular photos by manipulating them, using PicsArt app. Influenced by Cindy Scherman, I portray myself with different poses, characters, and styles. It has been fun doing the digital photo manipulations in creative ways. I will continue to work on the self-portrait projects and eventually have them framed and exhibited in a gallery or somewhere down the road. 

Enjoy those amazing photos I created. Click on those pictures to see them bigger.