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How To Create Minimalistic Landscapes Using Blur Filters in Photoshop

 For at least 10 - 15 years I love creating abstract minimalistic landscapes such as beach and forest scenes in my post processing of photos using a range of Photoshop's blur filters.  Here's one of my latest images that features this (and other) techniques: The original photo was taken almost 15 years ago with a 7 megapixel Canon Camera, but I wanted to challenge myself and try to make more interesting image out of it.  Start I came across this image while browsing through my photo archive and kind of liked the scene with the woman enjoying standing in or close to the surf. Editing Steps 1. I expanded the image from its 4:3 ratio to a square format making the added part transparent. Then I selected the blue sky and erased it. As I knew I wanted to create an abstract image I searched for a cloudy sky and found a suitable photo in my library, that would make a more interesting sky than a bland blue one.   I positioned this sky a layer under the beach photo and go...
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Making of FLUX - adding motion blur and sky to a photograph (Update Aug 25)

Hello,
When I start editing images in Lightroom I  sometimes use Presets to get an idea how the particular image can look like. I then play around with other adjustments, before I proceed adding textures or manipulate the photo further in Photoshop. Thus one can easily set a mood & tone with one click.

This was the case with my image FLUX.






Here is a sequence of the main stages






The original picture was shot around noon on a stormy day in the south of the island La Palma /Canary Islands. This rocky beach belongs to the volcanic part of the island, there is barley a plant only black lava stones and ash. The first picture is out of the cam, before I applied a Lightroom preset. These kind of landscapes or seascapes are ideal for my kind of surreal treatment. The hardest thing sometimes is to find the right tones for the mood I want to express. A lot of this is experimenting until I have the feeling " Yes, that is something I can build upon".

The cloudless blue sky was in need for one of my cloud textures. I chose JUNO from the Build-your-own-texture-pack but wasn't satisfied when I added it. I felt the need to further abstraction. I added a motion blur and did the same to the water. I took quite some time to select the water, but finally the result was quite satisfying.

There still was something missing - I decided to add a seagull heading for the rock.

Have a look at the layers:


From bottom to top:

I used the picture processed  in LR and selected the water  Most of the time I use Photoshop's Quick Selection tool and later do some fine tuning. As you can see I also used a layer mask and smart filters to have more control on the blur.

Added the bird and gave it a little motion blur

Added a bit light/haze on the water close to the horizon, thought that the clouds would reflect like that.

Added part of the sky texture and merged it with the background a bit by making it shine through (see layer mask)

Finally added some textures from the Vintage-Film-Photography-Pack

The first curves layer enhanced light and contrast.
The 2nd curves layer was for a correction of tones. I reduced the yellow and added a bit blue in the blue channel.

Further contrast enhancement with the help of the Levels tool.

Again, thanks for reading and have a nice weekend!

Dirk









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