Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 2, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.
art photo blend

Photo Blends 1: Collared Dove and Flowers

I’ve been continuing to play with GIMP, the open source photo editing software, to blend photos and create new digital art.

Usually, I create 7-10 iterations out of 2 photos and see where I end up. In August 2020, I shared 14 iterations from 1 photo of a dahlia in a post called The Arty Dahlia.

When I make these photo blends, which is my term for them, I never know where I will end up. One of the iterations mid-stream will be absolute dog puke, something I’d like to pretend never happened, but without that particular iteration, I would never have made it to an iteration I really like.

Here are two photos I blended in October/November 2020.**

Bouquet of roses, by Mary Warner, May 10, 2020.
Bouquet of roses, by Mary Warner, May 10, 2020.
Dead collared dove, by Mary Warner, October 23, 2020.
Dead collared dove, by Mary Warner, October 23, 2020.

Here are some of the results of the photo blending (my favorites, naturally!):

Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 1, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.
Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 1, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.

Below is my second favorite in the series.

Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 2, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.
Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 2, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.

Here is my favorite of the series.

Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 3, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.
Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 3, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.
Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 5, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.
Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 5, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.
Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 6, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.
Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 6, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.
Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 7, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.
Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 7, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.
Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 8, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.
Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 8, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.
Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 10, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.
Collared Dove & Roses, Iteration 10, by Mary Warner, Oct/Nov 2020.

 

** I have to get better at attaching a new date to my photo blends. GIMP starts with the date the original photo was taken and I alter the name based on what I’ve done in GIMP, but I always forget to change the date in order to let me know when I created the photo blends. In this case, I know that I took the collared dove photo on October 23, 2020, so I couldn’t have made the blends until after that date.

I also think I need to commit to putting watermarks on these. I didn’t think to do it when I started creating photo blends because I was just doing them for fun, but they are distinctive works made using photos I took, so I ought to do more than caption them.

Do you have a favorite in this series?