Good Fences - 7/17/14, Photo-Heart Connection - 8/1/14: "Early Evening Farm"

Good Fences Thursday challenges us to post an image of a fence or gate each week.


I've been experimenting with trying to make my images look like HDR (High Dynamic Range) photography. The way HDR is usually done is by using a tripod to take 3 photos, setting one to be slightly overexposed, one underexposed, and one exposed normally. Some cameras can take those three photos and pull the details from the lightest, darkest, and mid-range areas to give you one image with dynamic detail. If your camera can't do that, then some software can do it for you using your 3 photos.

Frankly, I hate carrying a tripod around with me and I just don't have the patience to change settings and take three shots.

Luckily for me, there are ways to "fake" HDR in Photoshop by using only one photo. 
If you want to try it yourself, use the instructions below the photo.
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Photo-Heart Connection: (addendum added 8/3/14) at the beginning of each new month, we are asked to choose one image we worked on during the previous month that has a special meaning for us, something close to our hearts.

I chose the photo below to represent the month of July for several reasons:  
1. I like the photo of the local farm which I pass frequently.  
2. I like farms, especially dairy farms.  I love the concept of a farm house and barn sitting in the middle of land that is worked by it's occupants, even though it's not the life for me. (Being a night-owl, I want nothing to do with pre-dawn chores.) 
3. I like cows.  They are fairly large creatures, yet are non-violent ones.  They seem to be content with chewing their cuds and making milk in a lackadaisical stupor.  Yet they are smart enough to find their way to the milking parlor and go to their own assigned stalls each day. I love cows' large soulful eyes.

However, my chief reason is:
4. This farm is surrounded by what is rapidly becoming "McMansion Heaven." I like that the dairy farmer has ---at least so far ---resisted selling off his land to create more huge, overpriced homes.  

Have you ever noticed that those communities are all named for things that have been destroyed to build them?   "Indian Meadow" hasn't an Indian nor a meadow in sight.  "Treesdale" used to be a huge apple orchard ---no apple trees survive there.  "Washington Farms" was built on farmland owned by someone named Washington, but crops and pastures are gone and all the Washington's have moved from their land. "Shady Creek" has few trees to keep it shady and the creek was diverted to an underground culvert.  

I used to, work in an industrial park called "Cranberry Woods" in Cranberry Township, PA. Three buildings and their parking lots were surrounded by acres and acres of trees.  I often saw deer and other wildlife from the back windows.  In the six years I worked there, the land was cleared for a hotel, three more office buildings, and accompanying parking lots.  Then a huge corporation cleared twice that much land to build a new complex and "For Lease" signs appeared on remaining wooded land.  Instead of "Cranberry Woods," it should now be called "Cranberry Clear-Cut." Besides being more truthful, the alliteration is almost catchy. 
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"Early Evening Farm"
Dairy Farm in Western PA
created by using "fake" HDR
After doing the last step (adding Ink Outlines) I erased them from
the sky (I didn't like the tiny black lines there) and then I slightly lightened the sky.
(click on image for larger view)

I prefer this method for creating fake HDR.
Follow these steps in Photoshop to try it yourself:

Note: the slider levels I used worked well on my photo. You can change those to look best on your image.

•Make your normal enhancements to correct levels, color, etc.
•Make a duplicate of that image
•On the duplicate: Go to Image> Adjustments> Shadows/Highlights
•Make sure Preview is checked so you will be able to see the changes on your screen
•Move the slider bars as follows:
        Shadows, Amount: 100%
        Highlights, Amount: 100%
        Midtone Contrast: between 80 and 100%.
        Tonal Width: 30% on both Shadows and Highlights 

Make adjustments up or down as you see fit.

Note: when you move one slider it will look terrible until you move other sliders.

•Hit OK when satisfied, then make more adjustments (lightness, saturation, etc.) if needed. At this point, you can do the optional step or, if you think the effect is "too much" lower the opacity so the layer below it shows through ---adjust until it looks right to you.

Optional step:

•Make a duplicate of that layer while in full 100% opacity.
•Make sure black is your foreground color and white your background color.
•Go to Filter Gallery
•Choose Brush strokes, then Ink Outlines.
You can play with the settings. I set mine at - Stroke length: 4, Dark intensity: 20, Light intensity: 10

•After hitting OK, change the opacity on that layer (I suggest 40 to 60%) and make other adjustments, if needed.  You can also change the opacity on the previous layer, if you want.

If your photo has a sky, you might want to erase the Ink Outlines from it ---they give the sky a lined texture that I don't like. Anything that is supposed to be smooth and light might need to have the lines erased. Or if you don't like the ink outlines, hide or delete that layer, or make it more transparent,  or click on control Z to undo.

Alternate method: In the latest version (Photoshop CC) you can go to Image> Adjustment> HDR toning and play with the possibilities there. (I'm not sure which was the first Photoshop version with this option. If your version doesn't have it, try using the instructions for the method I prefer, above.)

This is what my image looked like on the
layer where I worked with Shadows/Highlights.
You may chose to leave your image like this,
but I wanted to bring out more details and
make it a bit darker, so I went on to create
a layer using Ink Outlines (the image above)
but erased them from the sky.

This is what my original looked like after
a few enhancements.  I like this normal
photo image, but I'm always trying to
learn new techniques ---and pass them on.

 

Good Fences and Photo-Heart Connection - 6/26/14 "Follow the Leader"

Good Fences Thursday


Below is a photo of a farm I pass quite often. It's on a well-used road with no place to pull over and take photos. But early one Sunday morning, I was driving past the farm with no cars behind me, so I stopped to snap these Holsteins heading toward a pasture at the top of the hill (to the right and out of view). If you've ever observed grazing cattle, most of them face the same direction. That is because they follow the lead cow. Here they are "following the leader" to their grazing area.

How does a city girl know this?  For ten years I was the editor of "the MOOsletter" the cow lovers' quarterly, featuring "all the MOOs that's fit to print."

Addendum ADDED ON 7/2/14: 
I am linking this Photo to Photo-Heart Connection which asks us to choose a photo that we either took or worked on during the previous month (June) that has some emotional connection for us.

I'm a bovimaniac. 

I love cows because they aren't aggressive animals.  They stand around, eat grass, chew their cud, have calves and give milk ---and probably aren't too smart.

If well-kept, cows can be beautiful with their huge brown eyes. On a farm tour, a farmer I knew told me everyone knew instantly that I was a rookie. It was because I was taking photos of their faces while the real farmers were looking at "the business end" of the cows. 

I once attended a Holstein auction held in the ballroom of a hotel. The cows in their formal black and white colors, were cleaned and brushed and even had sparkly stuff on their coats.  They looked more at home in the ballroom than did the bidders ---farmers in worn jeans, plaid shirts, feed caps and filthy work boots.

Holsteins like these are the most common cows in PA and the U.S. ---and I think even the world ---because they are great milk producers.  I love Jerseys with their doe-like coloring. They're not as popular as they once were because their milk has a high fat content.

I was on a flight in Brazil and the man beside me was a cattle rancher. He asked me what kind of cattle were in my region. I told him if he asked 100 Americans I would guess 99 wouldn't know the answer, but he was sitting next to the right woman.  I didn't know the Portuguese words for some of the breeds, but when I described each common breed in my less-than -perfect Portuguese, he knew what I was talking about. I mentioned Holsteins, Ayrshires, Jerseys, Guernseys, Milking Shorthorns for dairy products and Herefords and Angus for beef.  I even knew about breeds he didn't know the names for, such as Belted Galloways --sometimes referred to as Oreo Cows because they are black at the front and back with a wide white band around their middles.

So, although this is not the best photo I produced or worked on in June, it is the one which has that special connection that makes me smile every time I see it.

If you click on the link above to "the MOOsletter" you will learn more about my cow obsession.

"FOLLOW THE LEADER"
(click on photo for a larger view)

THE CREATIVE PROCESS #10 COW PIE

"COW PIE"

(click on image for larger view)

This post is in response

to a writing prompt at

Mama's Losin' It.

Prompt: "SHOW US SOMETHING YOU MADE"

Click on the link to join in or view other responses.

Many people expect artists to be brooding, dead-serious, nonconformists. I suppose I might be characterized as a nonconformist, but I don’t brood and I am rarely dead serious about anything. In fact, I love to find humor in nearly everything, including my own art work.
I spent several years creating a series of about 50 works of art featuring cows which I called ‘visual puns.’ They had titles like “Americow Graffiti,” “It’s Only a Paper Moo,” “A Line of Bull,” “The Dark Side of the Moo,” “A Streetcow Named Desire”---well, you get the idea.
Most of the time, when I create works of art, I start with images and then have to think of clever titles. While I worked on these pieces, I went through lists of phrases, movies and songs, looking for titles I could turn into amusing cow puns, then came up with images that fit.
I created my art in acrylic paint on canvas, colored pencils, ink, and in mixed media. I had several exhibits featuring my cow art which resulted in a few interviews with Pittsburgh TV and newspaper reporters. What surprised me was that, eventually, I had my fifteen minutes of fame when the Dallas Morning News, CBS radio in NY City, Stars and Stripes, a morning radio show in South Australia, and newspapers as far away as the Gulf News in Abu Dhabi ran stories on my cow obsession.
One day on my way to work, the idea to create a work called “Cow Pie” came to me. Being an art teacher, I didn’t have to wait until I returned home to create what I had in my head. I started to work on it at lunch time, then stayed an extra hour after the students left and my “Cow Pie” was almost complete by the time I returned home.
On water color paper, I lightly drew a pie with a slice cut from it. I painted the pie and pie pan with watercolors. Once the watercolors dried, I added a few details with colored pencils. Then I cut the image from the watercolor paper and cut holes in the top of the crust and in the part where one would see the filling, with an Exacto knife.
When I took the ‘pie’ home, I selected some of my cow photos. (To help me with ideas and also to have ‘models’ to draw from, I took lots of cow photos at farms near my home.) I cut up the photos and glued them behind the holes in the ‘pie.’ Then I glued everything on a green background.
“Cow Pie” has always been a favorite at galleries and I have sold many reproductions of this piece. I am pleased when someone looks at one of these images and bursts into laughter.

See more of my cow art visual puns HERE and HERE.

Find gifts and products with the “Cow Pie’ image HERE.

And if you are really into cow puns, find a post full of them HERE.

Please search on the right sidebar under CREATIVE PROCESS for more of my art work and how I created it.

(art © 2001, text ©2009, C.J. Peiffer)

COW PARADE™ Chi-COW-go (Odd Shots)

"Chi-COW-go"

cow featuring a skyline view of the city

by

Nancy Parkinson

sponsored by

Central Michigan Avenue Association

These images are in response to

ODD SHOTS

Click on the link to post your own image

or see what others have posted.

In September of 1999, I visited Chicago to see the Cows on Parade™ displayed on street corners, parks and buildings throughout the city. Over 300 fiberglass sculptures had been decorated by Chicago artists. At the end of the exhibit, they were auctioned for charity. For a detailed story about the exhibit, see a previous post Chi-COW-go, Chi-COW-go, that CUDlin' town.

The photos below are a small sampling of the variety of designs on the cow sculptures. My very favorite, "Diamonds Are a Cow's Best Friend" by Victor Skzebneski and sponsored by Salvatore Ferragamo can be seen HERE.

"Holy Cow"

a tribute to long-time baseball announcer Harry Caray, sat near the WGN studios

by

Ken Aiken, Aardvark Studio

sponsored by

Harry Caray's Restaurant

"Double Moo"

cow in Doublemint Gum colors

by

Peter Van Vilet, Lou Beres & Associates

sponsored by

Wrigley's

"Fruits of Summer"

colorful cow near the aquarium along Lake Michigan

by

Shawn Finley

sponsored by

Chicago Park District

"LC1"
(as in "Elsie" I presume)

cow milk truck
by
David Innes
Sponsored by
BBDO-Chicago

"Out of Cowtowner'

typical bovine tourist

by

Manley Armstrong & Caren Spigland

sponsored by

BBDO-Chicago

(photos ©1999, text ©2009, C.J Peiffer)

Chi-COW-go, Chi-COW-go, that CUDlin’ town

"Diamonds Are a Cow's Best Friend"

(photos ©1999, C.J. Peiffer)

Until the summer of 1999, when I ruminated on Chicago I thought of wind, frigid temperatures, and Lake Michigan. Now, I think of cows.

I knew Chicago had acquired a few COWnnections throughout its history. A cow allegedly caused the 1871 Chicago fire. The Chicago Bulls had scored big in the city. Stockyards were once a ‘mooving’ force in the area’s economy. But that summer, there was a new perspective on beef in Chicago.

I was in moo heaven when I visited the Windy City. There was a cow on nearly every street corner, grazing in each park, guarding each museum entrance. These were no ordinary cows. Over 300 simple cow sculptures had been transformed into works of art. They were bedecked, bejeweled, and somewhat bewildering to those who hadn’t ‘herd’ about Cows on Parade™.

The concept began in Zurich in 1998 where 800 fiberglass cows were credited with increasing tourism by nearly a million visitors. After seeing the Swiss cows, Peter Hanig of Chicago’s Hanig Footwear approached Chicago’s cultural commissioner with the idea of creating a similar display.

With the help of the Swiss government, the city imported over 300 sculptures. Ironically, many of the unpainted cows arrived in Chicago on April 1. Although their arrival had nothing to do with April Fools Day, it seemed a curious COWincidence.

Cows were purchased by companies or individuals who contracted artists to complete the works. The city purchased a number to be painted by artists who had submitted design proposals. Some were set aside for student artists.

I’m not sure why we find cows so COWmical, but they seem to instigate a COWllective silliness. The exhibit opened in mid-June 1999 with a celebration that included an a cappella group of lawyers in cow suits. (That must have been 'a line of bull.')

The promotion was expected to infuse $300,000 into the creative community and milk the talents of local artists. The city hoped the event would attract a stampede of visitors and between 100 and 200 million tourist dollars.

I admit I was skeptical. How many, I wondered, would make a trip to Chicago to see these whimsical bovines?

On Saturday afternoon, as I strolled the mile of Michigan Avenue from the Water Tower to the Art Institute, the streets were crowded with a herd of bovine admirers. I had difficulty taking photographs without cow lovers appearing in my view finder. These were not shoppers who happened to stop to appreciate the art work. They were there ---cameras in hand ---to see the cows.

Cows were greeted enthusiastically. Visitors talked to them and posed with them. They couldn’t help but smile at these humorous art works. Children climbed, petted and hugged them.

Heidi Kooi of the Chicago Office of Tourism told me very few of the sculptures had been vandalized. Most damage came from fans loving them too much. Several ‘substitute’ cows filled in for those that had to be removed for repairs.

And the sculptures were udderly fantastic. The exhibit shows that art doesn’t have to be serious. It can be fun as well as creative. Some cows displayed bright abstract designs. Many wore painted flowers, animals, or clouds. Some had been COWmouflaged in astroturf, mirrors, mosaic tiles, or gumdrops.

You may have guessed that my personal favorites were the ones that resulted from a mass outbreak of cow puns. They were titled “Herd Instinct,” “Moovies,” “The Milky Way,” “Moollennium,” “Cowch Potato,” “On the Moooove,” “Cow Sweet It Is!” and “Dairy-Go-Round.”

“Udder Romance” was a red and white cow dressed in heart-printed shorts and bunny slippers. “Stampede” had been covered in postage stamps. “Chi-COW-go” featured the city’s skyline on its flanks. “Moooonwalk” wore a space suit. Among my favorites was “InCOWgnito,” a cow wearing a mask and disguised in zebra stripes. The “Out of Cowtowner” sported sunglasses, Hawaiian shirt, camera, and backpack.

“Black and White and Read All Over” had been sponsored by the Chicago Tribune. “Holy Cow”, a tribute to the late Harry Caray, sat in front of the WGN radio station. Grazing near the Wrigley Building, “Double Moo” had been assembled from the front ends of two cows and painted in shades of Doublemint green. The Illinois Lottery sponsored “Lucky,” a cow covered in numbers.

Homages to famous artists were plentiful. “Moonet” had been decorated with waterlilies. “Guernsica” had been cut apart and reassembled into a cubist work. “Jazz Chicago! Merci Henri” displayed Matisse-inspired motifs. “Odalisque (Reclining Nude)” had been mounted up-side-down. “DaVinci Cow” floated in the O’Hare terminal on wings designed for Leonardo’s flying machine.

Even though recent theories discount the culpability of Mrs. O’Leary’s cow, “Don’t Blame Daisy” and “Summer Heat” obviously referred to Chicago’s hottest event. “Mrs. O’Leary’s Cow” included a leaver that could be pushed downward for a ‘hot time’ triggering a hind leg to tip a stool and lantern.

In my opinion, the cream of the crop was “Diamonds Are a Cow’s Best Friend.” That flirtatious bovine wore a pink strapless evening gown, high heels, long gloves, ‘diamond’ jewelry and a seductive blonde curl on her forehead. Marilyn would have been charmed by her look-alike.

An unexpected consequence of the exhibit was that the horses from the city’s horse-and-carriage companies were not merely cowed by the colorful sculptures, they were downright terrified. Out of concern for public safety, horses were placed in a ring with a cow sculpture until they were comfortable with it. Chicago thus conducted the world’s first known sessions of cow therapy.

Cows on Parade™ ran through October 31, 1999 when the life-size painted and sculpted bovines were corralled for a cattle auction to benefit charities.

You can view more cow sculptures on another of my posts or via the Internet (see links below). Once you see the photos of the cows, you’ll be ruminating on Chicago’s bovine roots and thinking in cow puns, too.

(©1999, C.J. Peiffer)

Find more of my Cow Parade™ photos on a later post by clicking HERE.

Cows on Parade™, Chicago
More photos of the cows can be found at: http://www.chicagotraveler.com/cows_on_parade.htm

COW POETRY

"meMOOries"

mixed media (acrylic painting with photographs on stretched canvas)

(©2001 C.J.Peiffer)

LIFE BEGINS

(©1995 C.J. Peiffer)

                            The new-born calf,
                                 his damp black and white hairs plastered to his hide,
                                 huge brown eyes bewildered in his new-found world,
                                 rests, legs bent under him in the moist straw.
                            He raises his tiny head, is half up on one thin wobbly leg.
                            Unsteady, he falls, slumping to his straw bed, exhausted.
                            Another try and he is up, all trembling legs, scared eyes,
                                 and quivering ears.
                            The cow licks him with her large, rough tongue
                                 and nuzzles him under her belly toward her warm milk
                                 to fill his uncertain emptiness.

THE BOVINE COMEDY

"Jersey" (colored pencil drawing)

          Many people ask how a city dweller ever became interested in cows. I was never quite sure why my life took that turn, but I had a few clues.

          In the 1950’s my family spent a week on a dairy farm. Within thirty minutes of our arrival, I tramped into a fresh cow pie, ruining new sneakers, but after we helped with the milking for an entire week, I had gained respect for the dairy-farming family and the cows they nurtured.
          Before the end of the week, two newborn calves were named after my sister and me. For years, I thought that was the birth of my interest in bovines, although my curiosity was augmented by a two year stint as a teacher in a cattle region in northeastern Brazil. Years later, I read that cows were popular among city folk because we experience a collective guilt for the loss of our agrarian pasts.
          My overt passion for cows came after I purchased a cow item for my home. When friends asked why, I mentioned that I thought cows were rather enigmatic. They were large animals, yet not aggressive predators, they seemed to be thinking about something important while in a state of semiconsciousness. As an artist, I liked the graphic quality of Holsteins, but admitted to a particular fondness for doe-eyed Jerseys.
          With the help of friends and family, soon I was overwhelmed with over 1000 cow items grazing in my home. After moving from the city to a semi-rural area, I passed herds of cattle in every direction within a mile of my home. I was in cow heaven.

"MOOlah" (mixed media, ink, colored pencils, with digital enhancement)

          Soon I was creating cow art ---what I call visual puns. One of my first cow drawings was “MOOlah” a cow created by hand drawing dollar bills, using a magnifying glass to see the details on a real dollar.

"Stampede" (collage made entirely
from postage stamps with
 cow or dairy-related images)

          I created "Jersey," "Stampede," “A Line of Bull,” “COWllage,” “Beautiful Creamer,” “It’s Only a Paper MOO,” “emBOSSIE,” and “Blue MOO"---a total of fifty pieces for a solo exhibit entitled “The Bovine Comedy.” My cow work has been been purchased by Quanta Press in MN, as well as by individual collectors, and has been featured at a national cow-art show in NY State as well as local and regional exhibits.

          I kept asking myself why, if there were magazines like Cat Fancy, no one had published something for cow lovers. Finally I decided to do it myself. In the Fall of 1989, with only six subscribers, I published the first issue of the MOOsletter, the cow lovers’ quarterly ---featuring ‘all the MOOs that’s fit to print!’

          Up to that point, I knew little about cows. On a local dairy tour, a local farmer told me that I stuck out like a ‘rookie.’ “Why?” I asked. It was because I was taking photographs of the cows’ faces, while the real farmers were inspecting the ‘business end’ of the cows.
          I filled the MOOsletter with a mix of serious and humorous articles, making use of every imaginable cow pun. After a year of publication, I was rather knowledgeable about cows ---I could identify dozens of breeds, had learned terms like freshen, fodder, AI, and BGH, and could name the first cow to ever fly in an airplane.
          Over the years, the MOOsletter explored rotation grazing, alternative bedding materials, cow flatulence, miniature Herefords, dairy recipes, “sacred” cows in India, hoof trimmers, free-stall barns, farm museums, bovine diseases, and cattle auctions. We discussed cow postcards, cream separators, milk bottle collecting, cow creamers, cheese labels, and cow cookie jars and published several editions of a Cow-Buying Guide for collectors. We featured COWntests, bovine poetry, and cow fiction. Humorist Dave Barry granted permission to reprint two of his articles and we reproduced an excerpt from Mark Twain’s story in which Eve (of Biblical fame) discovers how milk gets into a cow.
          Best of all, I met ---either in person or through the mail ---hundreds of cow lovers like myself. At one time we had amassed over 500 subscribers in fifty states and a dozen foreign countries. Among subscribers were the Johnsons, long-time NY dairy farmers and Michele and Ed, also from NY, who argued good-naturedly over shelf space to display their cow-creamer and milk-bottle collections. Ruth in MN grew up winning ribbons with her 4-H calves and later claimed to have the world’s largest collection of cow paraphernalia, although Mrs. Moo from AZ, followed close behind. Mrs. Moo’s entire home was decorated in white with black spots and she wore cow clothing everywhere ---even to church. Nancy in MD wrote us often about her pet steer named Baby and a CA woman photographed her cow Pumpkin in wigs, hats, and costumes. An elderly PA woman contributed cow poetry. An IL man kept us up-to-date on Elsie collectibles. Fred from HI admitted the only cow item he had ever owned was a bottle of Elmer’s Glue, yet he sent us hundreds of news items about cows. Our ‘celebrity’ subscribers were Ben Cohen of Ben and Jerry’s and Woody Jackson who designed Ben and Jerry’s cow labels. Eventually we started an organization called C.O.W. ---Cow Observers Worldwide and held a COWnference.
          Throughout the ten years I published the MOOsletter, I was interviewed by reporters from the Pittsburgh Press, the Dallas Morning News, CBS radio in NY City, National Public Radio, radio stations in Japan and Australia. Articles turned up in Stars and Stripes, newspapers from all over the U.S., as well as publications in Japan, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom and the Gulf News in the United Arab Emirates.
          In 1999, after 40 issues, it was time to MOOve on to other things. The MOOsletter had been a labor of love, but was a great deal of work for someone teaching full-time and running a small art-related business and needing to spend more time with an elderly parent. A Boston subscriber offered to take over publication, but after one issue, he gave up the job as well.
          About eight years ago, my interest in digital art had led me down a different artistic path, as well. And when my elderly mother began going downhill, I had to give up on cows for a while.

          On a Thanksgiving weekend several years after I started collecting cow paraphernalia, my mother pulled out old 8 mm home movies. Between the silent images of family reunions, picnics, and vacations, I saw my two-year-old self flickering on the screen. I was being held on the back of a docile cow by my mother and a farmer. Finally I had discovered the real root of my bovimania. The incident must have left a warm, repressed memory that set me on the path that led to my fifteen minutes of notoriety as a cow artist and the founder and editor of the MOOsletter.

(art and text ©C.J.Peiffer)

"AmeriCOW Graffiti" acrylic on stretched canvas

"Cow Pie" watercolor, colored pencils and photographs

"meMOOries" acrylic and photographs on stretched canvas