Pat Centeno  


Antelope by Pat Centeno

January 2018 - Antelope

January 2018 - Pat Centeno

Original

About the Image(s)

In San Antonio area's drive-through Wildlife Park, I shot two near-identical photos of this appealing critter among the flowers. Canon 7D with 300mm lens, ISO200, f/9, 1/200sec. Of course, the one I preferred seemed to have just one horn, but the other one appeared in the following shot (in which it moved its head slightly), so I stacked the shots in Photoshop and masked it back in, before cropping. I also had to select the eye area to get back detail in the shadows. I darkened the corners slightly, also. Using Topaz Impression, I selected a medium stroke of type 5 with brush size .50 and paint volume .10, increasing the saturation slightly to .20. Afterwards, I used a grey mask (painted med grey on the mask) to lightly bring back some of the antelope's features and the flower it had been nibbling at its feet. I didn't care for a pinkish area that Impression emphasized behind the animal, so I cloned in some more trees in that spot.


This round’s discussion is now closed!
5 comments posted




Not only is the animal beautifully shown but the supporting foliage and flowers are wonderful without overlapping critical parts of the head and neck.
Although I dont ordinarily think of painting animals (& you are making me re-think this), your rendition is beautiful.
it is not overdone.   Posted: 01/10/2018 10:20:16



Pat Centeno   Pat Centeno
Thank you for your kind words, Cyril. I hope you might try painting an animal image once in the future, for fun.

And on second thought, this might have been the Dama Gazelle. I wouldn't want to mislead any nature people with the identification. Hard to recall after seeing it over a year ago! But whatever it's called, I enjoyed working with the image. It looked so appealing in that flower meadow.   Posted: 01/10/2018 19:19:59



 
Nicely done, Pat. Your photoshop pre-planning and editing is well thought-out and helps the image. The painterly effect is quite effective at cleaning up the background and giving the image a nice mood.   Posted: 01/11/2018 19:28:39



Nancy Speaker   Nancy Speaker
Hi Pat, lovely scene and lovely painting. Thank you for explaining all steps you used. That is very helpful for me. I like the soft colors. You may want to clone, or make it darker to fit in with the background. It almost looks like a horn coming out of his head. see my review image.   Posted: 01/24/2018 01:52:14
Comment Image
Pat Centeno   Pat Centeno
That's funny, Nancy. Here you're removing the horns that belong there and I had had to make the effort to locate its second horn from another photo to add it back in, so it wouldn't appear to be a unicorn. Yes, it's supposed to have horns. ;-)   Posted: 01/24/2018 21:32:58