My First Matte Painting

I’ve become really fascinated with matte painting recently and wanted to give it a shot. I found this tutorial online and decided I needed to do it. You should click to see this much larger.

This is what I’ve been up to lately. Not shooting, but pushing my photoshop skills. I’m mostly self taught. As someone who spent way too long in school and then spent time teaching, I believe you can teach yourself just about anything if you have the desire.

It seemed like a lot of my teachers could have been replaced by a book. All they did was lecture straight from the book and hardly ever added anything unique to justify their salary. So, why the hell do I need to pay someone to read a book to me? I don’t. I’ll get the book and teach myself in the comfort of my home while listening to music.

Believe it or not, this started out as 2 daytime images of Florence and Cairo.

After turning it to a night scene, I painted in the fires, smoke, and lighting. It was really fun bringing the city to life and controlling the light. I’ve had this idea of painting with light for quite some time, and this is probably the first time I’ve actually done what I had envisioned a long time ago.

My finished version isn’t quite finished, but it was close enough for me to share. I think I want to crop some off the sides and add more smoke and fire. I’ll probably light up more windows too.

App Review: LensFlare

LensFlare is an app by BrainFeverMedia that allows you to add a wide variety of lens flares and a handful of textures to your image. The selection is quite impressive for the price. The best thing about LensFlare is its very easy to use. Touch where you want the flare to go, pinch with two fingers to adjust size, and twist with two fingers to rotate.

 

You can also adjust the brightness and color of the flare. Below that is the opacity slider for the texture if you add any to your image.

If you want to add more than one flare, tap on the 2nd icon from the right to pull up the screen below. Choose Render (add flare)…obviously. While we’re on this screen, I’ll add that you can also just save the flare(s) instead of the flare(s) on top of the image. I’ll show an example I made by mistake at the end.

Thats all there is to the app, its very easy with some cool textures that you’ll see in the examples below. These are sample images that come with the app so you can practice on good photos.

The flare and texture below were suppose to be applied to the boat image, but I must have pressed the wrong save button. This is what you get when you just save the flares.

 

Here is the promo video for LensFlare.

http://www.brainfevermedia.com/apps/LensFlare.html

Conclusion

If you’re a fan of lens flares or you’re into doing some serious photo manipulation on your phone, then LensFlare is a must have. It’s really excellent at what it does and I think its a steal at this price. Having said that, I don’t think this app is for all photographers. I see it as a great tool for the more creative types.

 

Rating:   5/5

Price:  iPhone 0.99     iPad  2.99  (iPad version includes the LensLight app)

 

Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad.Requires iOS 3.2 or later

***Full disclosure, I did not pay for this app, I asked for a promo code so I could review it. I’m not being offered any compensation for this review. ***