Austin

 

I've been creating some fun, artsy heritage layouts this past year, like this one, but haven't really tried it for current layouts & photos. But I was feeling in an experimental mood! 

Sometimes when I am driving on my long daily commute, I plan layouts or different techniques. I just think and think about something I want to do, and figure out how I might accomplish it in Photoshop. I've been wanting to create narrow horizontal stripes to experiment with texture and effects. My hope is to achieve a kind of 'engraved' look, like old engraved drawings from the 19th century. The PS halftone/ line filter in the Sketch artistic filter, doesn't work well for me because the lines are not crisp and sharp, and because it's a filter, not a layer or brush. I totally love halftone dots, and lines, and like the added texture and interest they give my layouts. So, I just started layering photos & playing with blending modes, and halftones & stripes (used as both brushes & eraser), until I got the effects I wanted.

On our trip to Texas, we spent quite a bit of time in Austin. On Friday, Ian took the day off, and we actually made two trips to Austin. Bruce, Ian and I spent the morning in Austin kicking around, and met Jessica for lunch at Zocalo, her favorite Mexican restaurant. We had to go back to Kyle to pick grandson Aidan up from school,  and then we went back to Austin to go to the Texas State History Museum. It was a fabulous museum, and although Aidan found it a bit boring (after all, he's only 6, and the museum is three stories high!), he was a champ, and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. We all met for dinner at the Shady Grove restaurant.. a typical, trendy, and funky eatery designed to feel a little like you're camping at a KOA campground.

Sunday afternoon we returned to Austin to walk around & see the sights while we waited for sunset when the bats make their nightly swarm.  Hundreds of thousands of bats live underneath the Congress Avenue bridge over Lady Bird Lake, and each evening from about April to October, they swarm out of their temporary home, and fly off in search of food.  You can read more about it here.  So, my layout celebrates downtown Austin- the capitol building, the giant star outside the Texas History Museum, the Congress Street Bridge,  the sign for the museum,  son Ian and husband Bruce, and of course, the bats.