My cousin who loves, loves animals sent me a photo of a friend’s beloved rescue dog who had just died. She asked if I could give her some photo love. So, I did. I have no animals, not even a bird.
And, I loved doing it, too.
Really, really loved doing it. Then, I realized why.
Years ago, as in over 60 years ago, we had a German Shepard named Toby. My brother and I loved him wildly, madly, truly. One day we came home from school and he didn’t run out to meet us. He was gone my mother said. Not sure what happened. Maybe hit by a car. Maybe a stranger stopped for him. We worried for days, weeks, months. Years later, as in maybe 25 years, my brother told me our Mother had to give him away because he was barking all day long while we were at school.
He never forgave her. My heart never mended.
So, now, I guess I try to mend other broken hearts with some photo love.
Plus, you gotta love a dog named, “Heaven”. Almost as much as one called, “Toby”.
Here’s a short video of what I did with the snapshot. I first used the magnetic lasso tool in Photoshop to extract him from the background. Made a separate layer. Then experimented with textures. Picked one or two and then used the Topaz Impressions Plug In to do a sketch as well as some painting versions. I decided to combine one of the sketches with one of the painting versions. If you experiment with textures and plug ins like Impressions, you’ll end up with so many choices your head will hurt. My advice is to pick one or two color palettes that you like and refine it from there.
