I heard about this guy who decorated his Christmas tree with nothing but Uglydoll keychains. Then he took a bunch of pictures of the Uglytree and posted them on the internet for everyone to see.
Twitter app crashed
I've been busy this evening on the old Photoshop, my initial thought was to make a Christmassy avatar for Twitter, but after I finished and resized the image it just didn't look good as all you could see was a brown smudge because the image was too small.
So instead I'm going to print it out as a christmas card for the family.
Without further ado, here it is.
I'm not totally pleased with it, there's something about it that I can't get my finger on, it just doesn't look right to me. I think I've been a little bit too over-ambitious with this one and my shopping skills are simply not up to it. I think it may be because I started off with an image that was computer generated and I've made it too real.
Anyhow, just for those of you who are interested I saved a few intermediate stages for you to see how I went about producing the finished result.
I started off with these two pictures, one is the poster from the film Christmas Carol and a photo I took of myself.
The crucial part of this stage is to get the right pose to go with your base image.
I took around thirty photos before I finally settled on the one that I used.
I simply took a rough selection of my head then copied and pasted it onto the base image and flipped it horizontally.
Taking the eraser tool, set on soft with a large brush setting I erased the parts I didn't need. I ended up with the next image.
As you can see theres a lot of work to be done now to blend my face to match the background. This took me an absolute age to get right. The more time you spend doing this the better the result will be. It's a combination of curves, brightness/contrast, photo filters, vibrance, colour filters and further erasing until I have come to a stage where I think the colours look like they should.
It's certainly not easy to do when the image I chose doesn't have much to go on to start off with. I took around three hours to get it to some kind of semblance of being right.
Even then I kept playing around with it until I thought that if I carried on there would be nothing left.
The final stage was to add all the candle light highlights on my face and glasses.
This was simply done by copying pieces of the light in the top hat and pasting them where I needed them.
The skill here is in resizing them and manipulating the shapes by using the liquify tool. It takes a little time to get it right as you can only use this on one layer so you are literally working blind by shaping the piece without being able to see the background, so a lot of it is guesswork.
Hope you all like it, took me ages and I think I may yet work on it some more but I needed to stop for a while just in case I overworked it. Any thoughts?
...we could be off oil immediately.
That’s a surprise. The compose window only took minutes to load, rather than days. Miracles never cease.
For your entertainment, two videos featuring a Q&A with Gene Hunt himself, Philip Glenister. The f words have been bleeped out, but they’re not words you’d expect the fictional DCI Hunt to use. And the real-life Philip Glenister doesn’t have very nice transport here. Where are the Cortina and Quattro?
- 12:09 On the 3rd day of the #12Days of Wishing ... For $20US/$25Canadian get 1lb of Christmas Blend and a $10 @Starbucks Card. #
- 12:19 @solcita feet pain is among the worst. you forget how much you use them. hope you feel better soon. #
- 15:17 RT @hardlynormal: PLEASE PPL! when giving to food drive don't give CRAP! Think FAMILES! Yes, we just p/u a bunch of this post.ly/EAF1 #
- 15:18 RT @abc7newsBayArea: BREAKING: Italian jury convicts Amer student Amanda Knox of murdering her roommate, gets 26 years. bit.ly/4Hcm1N #
- 15:35 @StealthWarp i am also sure some people like sardines - but probably not kids. Maybe peanut butter or canned spaghetti. #
- 15:42 RT @undomesticdiva: You have *all* weekend to enter - Starbucks giveaway, children not included. Yet. tinyurl.com/yclvqdk #
- 23:13 @dave_blogworld that looks amazing! #
- 23:56 @Mjausson mail is sometimes more important than we give it credit for. hope it arrives safely! #
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As the Huskers and ’Horns get set to go toe to toe in under the big top in Texas, get your pregame overload from Omaha (1, 2, 3, 4, 5), Lincoln (1, 2, 3), Austin (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6),* Dallas (1, 2, 3),* Houston (1, 2), San Antonio (1, 2), Fort Worth (1, 2, 3), Kansas City. Commentary: Shatel, McKeever, Sipple, Johnston, Bohls, Golden, Sherrington*
- 03:27 I just unlocked the "Crunked" badge on @foursquare! bit.ly/82rU5X #
- 03:27 I just unlocked the "School Night" badge on @foursquare! bit.ly/5Kq8ra #
- 03:27 Waiting on my chicken to cook, this song comes on, and suddenly I smell like you. (@ Whataburger 324) bit.ly/5RSBB8 #
- 14:31 So, is everything cancelled tonight because of the snow? (Yes, I'm just getting out of bed.) #
- 15:11 New photo on Flickr: Snowy Mazzy bit.ly/5auaZs #
- 15:23 Really starting to come down out here in Spring (uploading video now). Guess I will be staying in tonight. Maybe the endless RB setlist? #
- 15:30 This is freaking genius! Wear it, @JRCohen! RT:@JenXer I...resisted...as long as I could... #draw365 #JRinabikini yfrog.com/4avyzuj #
- 15:47 New photo on Flickr: Snowier Mazzy bit.ly/8itHHB #
- 15:56 Here's my front yard (with Mazzzy!) & backyard showing the snow coming down out in Spring: bit.ly/6dZr8r & bit.ly/7R9Dim and #
- 16:55 Amazon mp3 Deal of the Day is 'Christmas Songs' by Diana Krall for only $2.99. Her voice is so pretty. bit.ly/5FoKIy #
- 18:14 RT @ASTROGaming: Retweet this for a chance to win one of the new @upperplayground A40 Audio Systems! bit.ly/6x6c8H #astroupcontest #
- 18:17 RT @GuitarHero: "I got the Fall of Troy DLC, now I want this prize pack too bit.ly/8EH1Q6!" RT for your chance to win! #
- 19:12 OMG! JR kept his word! Rock on! RT @JRCohen: tweetphoto.com/5840697 #
- 20:17 Only good thing abo ut staying in because of the weather is that I'm finally making some progress on Rock Band again. #
- 22:29 @smurfing74: Hearsay does indeed rock. Please tell Joe that the girl he cut an apple for last night says hi. #
- 02:00 Made serious progress through all the venues in Rock Band. Only have eleven more unique ones before I've played everywhere. Hand hurts now. #
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- 00:05 RT @nebraskabuzztap: Daily Nebraskan >> Husker wrestlers prepare for Cliff Keen Las Vegas Invitational bit.ly/6Hw8jO #
- 00:06 @thesocialpulse - glad to see they fixed it #
- 00:49 Trying to read before bed, always end up back on my iPhone. #
- 00:54 RT @HuskersGameday: New post: BCS Breakdown heading into Championship Weekend bit.ly/4ODFEM #
- 03:42 Fell asleep early, phone went off at 0200. Been trying to go back to sleep and can't. Ugh. #
- 03:43 Knew that I should've shut the ringer off before turning in. Guess I'll go downstairs and pick up my guitar. #
- 03:46 @Ambeeer - I'd say skip out on Friday and just party Saturday after the game. #
- 04:39 @adrenalynntoao - Thanks. Been browsing apps for my iphone to pass the time since I've been awake..lol. I'll try to zzz again in an hour. #
- 04:46 @adrenalynntoao - Space Ace (game I played when I was a kid), Eliminate Pro (still learning the controls), Personal Assistant. #
- 04 :59 Didn't even know the gameboy was available for that! Whoa! Eliminate Pro reminds me of Quake, I want Street Fighter or Killer Instinct on it #
- 05:03 <------Listening to @Hatebreed right now. Still can't sleep though. Weak. #
- 05:04 Not really listening. Just watching video clips from their concert last month in Dallas. Kind of sort of the same thing, but not really #
- 05:13 @danadearmond - Great eye color #
- 05:44 It's hard to find a comfortable balance between your current w... More for Sagittarius twittascope.com/twittascope/?sign=9 #
- 06:36 Reading still... Waiting for my iPhone to finish charging. Then going to try and sleep (again) #
- 07:08 @adrenalynntoao - good luck! #
- 15:10 Same here. I stillneed to buy a parking pass. Or call a taxi. RT @huskerzone: I seriously can't wait for this game tomorrow #Huskers #
- 15:13 Didn't sleep well the night before, off tomorrow, but tonight is going to drag. :-/ #
- 15:14 @TheFisherbabe - thank you for the #FF . How is your day so far? :-) #
- 15:22 @TheFisherbabe - I know what you mean. My alarms are set, I'm ready for a big game. Going to ask for the time off for the next game too! #
- 15:31 How did I get suckered in buying Leslie's jersey? The bet after the Pats/Saints game was I buy one for me if the Pats lost. She heard wrong. #
- 15:31 Eh, oh well... #
- 17:55 WTF? RT More Texas-sized arrogance from John Kelso: "Why should Texas have to deal with the nuisance from Nebraksa?" bit.ly/6aMiBw #
- 18:04 @Am ethyst7123 - me too, picked up subway though #
- 18:46 @MarketingJedi - it's not that cold out. It was -16 in my hometown last night, THAT is cold. LoL #
- 18:48 @DoubleXtraPoint - he'll feel like an ass if Nebraska pulls off the upset. #
- 19:39 RT @ATTNews: Forget the Ads—Proof that AT&T’s 3G network out performs Verizon's bit.ly/6Vcnwr #
- 20:09 @BigRedinTejas - yes... Yes you should. #
- 20: 09 @NaughtyAlysha - why not? #
- 20:10 @LolaHedoOnline - ewwwww #
- 20:55 @LolaHedoOnline - word.... #
- 20:56 @BigRedinTejas - agreed #
- 21:05 @LolaHedoOnline - it's scary....lol #
- 22:16 @MarketingJedi - actually I'm in Arlington. I was checking the temp in my hometown back in NW Neb. last night and noticed the minus 16. #
- 22:17 @MarketingJedi - coldest day I experienced growing up there was minus 20. Brrr #
- 22:21 @MarketingJedi - from my hometown at 8am. Definitely glad I live down here in Texas. I hate the snow. LoL twitpic.com/s73bj #
- 22:39 @comparingapples - ditto. I want Hefeweizen #
- 23:07 @comparingapples - the nectar of the Gods. ;-) #
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