The term pointillism, refers to a school of artists of the Neo-Impressionist movement founded by Georges Seurat during the late 1800s. Pointillism used a technique of painting with tiny dots and dashes of pure colors that would blend in the viewer's eye. Some other artists who used this style were Henri-Edmond Cross and Paul Signac.
This is what we will be making
All you need to do this tutorial is PSP 8 which you can get here: www.jasc.com.
Note: This effect works best on landscape photos which contain large, light colored areas, such as sky or water. I've tried it on flower photos and although you get an interesting look, the result doesn't look like pointillism. It does NOT work well on photos of faces.
If you need photos to work on, try this site, especially the Nature and Architecture pages.
Let´s begin!
1. Open up the photograph you want to use, and resize it if necessary. It should be no larger than 400px on the longest side.
Duplicate the layer 2 times. Name the bottom layer "paint", name the middle layer erode", and name the top layer "noise". (This helps you keep track of what you're doing.)
2. Turn off the visibility on the top two layers and working on your background layer, go to Effects>Art Media Effects>Brush Strokes and use these settings:
3. Activate the erode layer and make it visible. Go to Effects>Edge Effects>Erode. Change the layer blend mode to Soft Light.
Note: Step 4 is Optional depending on the image you're using. If your image seems dark at this point, then do Step 4, otherwise go directly to Step 5.
4. Go to Adjust>Brightness and Contrast>Brightness/Contrast. Set the Brightness to 75 and the Contrast to 15.
5. Activate the "noise" layer and make it visible. Go to Adjust>Add/Remove Noise>Add Noise. Use these settings:
6. Now we need to lighten up the "Noise" layer a bit. Go to Adjust>Brightness and Contrast>Brightness/Contrast. Set the Brightness to 75 and the Contrast to 15.
6b. Go to Adjust>Hue and Saturation>Hue/Saturation/Lightness. Set the Hue, the Saturation and the Lightness to "0" and check the "Colorize" box like this:
7. Change the layer blend mode to Soft Light and adjust the layer opacity to around 80.
8. Go to Effects>Edge Effects>Find all.
9. Go to Adjust>Blur>Motion Blur. Set your Angle to 50.00 and the Strength to between 10.00 and 15.00. You will have to adjust the strength according to your image. The effect that you're trying to get should look something like alternating light and dark brush strokes.
10. Go to Effects>Edge Effects>Enhance.
11. Go to Adjust>Softness>Soften.
Note: If the "brush strokes" look too harsh at this point, repeat this step.
12. Go to Layers>Merge>Merge All (Flatten).
12b. Go to Adjust>Brightness and Contrast>Brightness/Contrast, Brightness=35 Contrast=5 (or whatever works best with your image).
Sign it, frame it, and......you're done!
Here's the result my tester "Mur" got on a photograph of ocean waves crashing on rocks.
I hope you enjoyed this tutorial.
*~Nightshadow~*
This tutorial is my own creation, any similarity to any other tutorial on the Internet is unintentional. It is copyrighted by me, Nightshadow, on February 01, 2004 and is not to be copied or reproduced in any way under penalty of law. Graphics lists, please e-mail me for permission to post my tutorials, especially because I would love to see the results :O)
NOTE: Any image you make using this tutorial is completely your own property.
