Green Leaves

Some times we see things too clearly. We see the colors and the forms, the shadows and the light. And seeing all these things without discriminating can be too much.

That's what my little Kodak does: it sees too much. The light meter averages the fall of light into the picture frame. It makes average scenes non-spectacular.

The averaging meter turned the original of this shot into something pretty, but unremarkable. The shot lacked color saturation. Since color played a big role in attracting me to the original shot, the photo results should speak loudly to color.

Photoshop to the rescue. A few PS tricks allowed me to show full color saturation in the leaves and the flowers. I was also able to to separate the foreground leaves from the background flowers by softening the flowers. The results? Something much closer to the scene that attracted me in the first place.

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Turkey Legs

Turkey Legs

 Gerry Zeck Photoshop manipulation, Dualities Series

The August Egg Revolt

I just rediscovered this image in a folder entitled "August Eggs". It's a photoshop manipulation, of course, and it's colorful. Makes me think of Ukranian Easter Eggs. 

But what is it? Where does the image derive from? 

About ten years ago, in the month of August, I was making nautical charts on my computer over 80 hours a week. I had little time to enjoy the luxuries of eMail conversations. Most of my electronic correspondents were male, many of whom insisted in sending me X-rated images (it's a male bonding thing).

I was offended by the imagery, not because it involved naked people, but because most images were aesthetically ugly, pathetically predictable and inspirationally dead. So I decided to fashion a revolt against the ugliness and sexploitation; I decided to manipulate until I was satisfied with the image. Hence, tasteless porn sparked the August Egg Revolt.

My Blue Phase

My photographic point of view has changed drastically since the middle 1960's when I published my first nude studies in Good Photography and Salon Photography Magazines.

Attitudes toward photographic nudes have swung with the national politic; photographic nudes always being more acceptable to the public during liberal times. 

Sensing the return of sunnier days, I believe it's time to review a few of my early photoshop manipulations that portray the human condition sans cloth. These manipulations are part of the Anima series

Waiting

Rabiana

Gesture 1

Amatao (I love)

Dualities: Blue 82

Blue 82 is one of a great number of manipulated images I made while learning Photoshop in the middle Nineties. All digital images are susceptible to a Dualities theme.  Unexpectedly beautiful symmetries result from using Photoshop's basic graphics toolbox. Blue 82 derives from a single, original image.

PumaSkyLily

It's Monday and I'm teetering on the verge of organized photo files. This is also my Monday morning lie. I must tell myself these things to avoid the deep depression that comes with self burial. 

When I began learning Photoshop in 1994 I needed a suitable subject to work on, something to see me through the trials of patience and exasperation.  We had just arrived in a new home and were about to experience life in a 3 br 1957 rambler w/ pool. 

The resultant photoshop collage was PumaSkyLily, a salute to my working wife. I took images from what was happening at the time. (1) landscape pix and (2) pool snapshots were combined while learning the tools and filters of photoshop 2.5. 

Doing what the computer does best, her figure was duplicated and suspended above a filter distorted sky. Lilies twirl above their pads and fill the active four corners. The bird landscape framed the mandala.