Avaleha

Nikolai

Today I took my youngest on a little (5 miles) hike alone the Backbone Trail in Santa Monica Mountains.

Along the path we encountered a single tree whose flowers were somehow akin to the "flying souls" from the Avatar's Tree Of Souls:

#1: The Tree of Souls



Needless to say, we decided to see if we can pull off some avatar-looking scene with it. We took a few snaps (did I mention I had my 5D2 with 24-105 on it with me?;-), and here is the one I later decided to use as a base image for the future post-processing.

#2: Avaleha - original



After the hike was done and we had a nice relaxing dinner in our favorite sushi place (which was conveniently located right on our way home:-) I popped up my copy of CS5 and started playing... Here's what I came out with.

#3: Avaleha


Enjoy! C&C welcome!

This post was made with the assistance of Star*Explorer

digidrone

That's KEWL

Eclipsed

How'd you get CS5? Great shot by the way

Surfdog

Wow, that is too cool.

Nikolai

digidrone wrote:

That's KEWL

Thanks, Royce!

Nikolai

Eclipsed wrote:

How'd you get CS5? Great shot by the way

I've been on CS5 Beta Team, so I have been using it for quite a while. They recently lifted the NDA, so we're allowed to talk about it and show the results;-)
And thanks!

Nikolai

Surfdog wrote:

Wow, that is too cool.

Thank you Danny!

heatherfeather

Pretty awesome! Very nicely done! I bet she totally loves it!

So... are you allowed to tell us about CS5?

Nikolai

heatherfeather wrote:

Pretty awesome! Very nicely done! I bet she totally loves it!

Looks like she does :-)

So... are you allowed to tell us about CS5?

Now - yes. However, the aforementioned links (in CS5 thread) lead to articles that describe it rather adequately. Nevertheless, I'll be happy to answer any particular question..

adbsgicom

Really amazing, Nik.
Not having any basis of having a clue as to what was involved in doing something like this, are there features of CS5 that made this possible, or much, much easier? I'm not running out to get CS5, but curious nonetheless.

Nikolai

adbsgicom wrote:

Really amazing, Nik.
Not having any basis of having a clue as to what was involved in doing something like this, are there features of CS5 that made this possible, or much, much easier? I'm not running out to get CS5, but curious nonetheless.

Thank you!
In fact, I don't think CS5 is necessary for this (the fact that I'm using it is simply due to the reason I'm using it all the time for beta testing purposes).
Technically speaking, CS4 would be almost the same. And even with the previous version it would be also possible, but I used BW and Hue/Saturation adjustment layers. HS was in PS for quite some time, but BW appeared only in CS3 methinks. In any case everything I did would be possible even in PS7, it simply would be far less convenient...

Shima

digidrone wrote:

That's KEWL

awesome, you are my hero

Sam

I love it!

Sam

adbsgicom

Nikolai wrote:

Thank you!
In fact, I don't think CS5 is necessary for this (the fact that I'm using it is simply due to the reason I'm using it all the time for beta testing purposes).
Technically speaking, CS4 would be almost the same. And even with the previous version it would be also possible, but I used BW and Hue/Saturation adjustment layers. HS was in PS for quite some time, but BW appeared only in CS3 methinks. In any case everything I did would be possible even in PS7, it simply would be far less convenient...

Thanks!

Nikolai

Shima wrote:

awesome, you are my hero

Thank you Cat!

Nikolai

Sam wrote:

I love it!
Sam

Glad to hear that Sam!

Agnieszka

Ha!!

Macushla

clapLove it. You could probably make a bunch of $$$ avataring people's myspace and facebook photos.

Nikolai

Agnieszka wrote:

Ha!!

Thanks Angie!

Nikolai

Macushla wrote:

clapLove it. You could probably make a bunch of $$$ avataring people's myspace and facebook photos.

Hmm, interesting idea! I guess I shall put myself out there, uh? ;-)
Thanks!

Nikolai

"Avaleha" blog post was featured at Miss Online :ivar