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Playing with Filters--Adding fun effects to your photos
Ramie Ahlstrom - Scrapping Deck Cruise DirectorFilter: A colored glass or other transparent material used to select the wavelengths of light allowed to reach a photosensitive material (as defined at Dictionary.com).
If we were all still using film cameras, the definition above would seem a little less foreign than it probably does to most digital camera users! While there are filters of the traditional sense available for digital cameras, they are expensive and not easy to find. But, technology is a wonderful thing, and many companies have designed filters that work in software packages designed specifically for altering photos. Now almost anyone can take an ordinary snapshot and turn it into a professional looking photograph in a just a few mouse clicks!
Adobe Photoshop Elements comes with many pre-installed, ready to use filters. I've been experimenting with them a bit but have yet to get results worthy of showing you all! So, when I came across a downloadable filter called Virtual Photographer from optikVerve Labs, I fell in love! It's a super easy-to-use program that has more than 50 preset filters to let you alter your photos to your heart's content!
This program has presets for color photos as well as for black and white, and it has a custom setting section where you can design your own filter! Playing with my digital photos has never been more fun!
To use the program, simply download it from their website (which you can easily find by doing a Google search), and then install it as instructed. Then open a photo in Photoshop Elements, click on the Filter menu at the top, and scroll down to optikVerve. A new window will open, which is the actual Virtual Photographer program. You can then play with the settings, and when you've found one you like, click Process. Your photo will go from ordinary to stunning in seconds!
Creating aged photos is super easy using Virtual Photographer. Here are two layouts, one that uses real aged photos (with the Flashback filter applied) as well as one that uses a very recent photo turned old, with the Anvil filter. I think it almost resembles a photo by the famous Ansel Adams.
Using these filters, I've created some of my favorite digital layouts. This one captures my niece's gorgeous blue eyes, and I absolutely love the altered photo!
Here's one that uses one of my favorite photos of my daughter. She looks so happy! The filter added some serious light diffusion and makes the photo pop even more.
Adding a dreamy filter to a sleeping child photo can take a layout from good to great. In this layout, I used the Bluetone filter. I think it fantastically brings out the details in the photo, as well as making it look dreamier!
Using the sepia toned filters in the Virtual Photographer program can give your photos a very vintage feel in no time! (No need to wait 30 years for them to age themselves…he, he, he.) I used the Brownie filter to make this photo match the backgrounds I used for the layout, giving it a timeless feel.
Using the Virtual Photographer filters is not limited to photos. When using digital scrapping elements, you can easily change the look of them using any of the available filters. I really liked a blue snowflake patterned background that I had downloaded, but the blue tones didn't match the photo I wanted to scrap on it, so I changed the background colors using the Shoebox filter. It changed it to a black and white based color scheme, allowing me to more easily match my photo to the background.
I hope to play more with the Photoshop Elements filters soon, but for now, the Virtual Photographer filters are so much fun and so easy to use! I hope you find it as fun to work with as I do!
Happy scrappin'!
Ramie Ahlstrom
ramieahlstrom@ssreflections.com
Scrapping Deck Cruise Director
Reflections Publishing Group, LLC
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