About the Image(s)

I took the original image of a Pryor Mountain, WY wild horse band in July 2025. The light was harsh and as animals in the wild tend to do, the subjects didn't pose in the most photogenic place or way. This presented an opportunity to work on my compositing skills. I chose one of the many backgrounds licensed to me, for a fee, from the Daily Texture. My goal was to incorporate the horses into the background so that it looked as though I had painted the scene. I moved them around and used layers to separate them from the original onto the new background. The separation process is always a challenge and as good as the tools are in PS, I almost always end up using a brush in PS to hand paint some of the details in.. such as hair and grass around feet. I use the brushes in Kyle's Paintbox, but for most jobs, the legacy PS brushes work well... paint and smudge into the original. Adjusting the colors, temperature and saturation to the background is essential to getting a natural look. This particular image had harsh shadows, which I softened using the smudge tool in PS. Softening the horses with a slight blur filter selectively applied also helps blend them in. Finally, I selectively applied a painterly texture in a low opacity with a PS action called the Kandinsky effect. It is part of a purchased collection from Greater than Gatsby.
Your comments and suggestions are welcome, and particularly, whether you would favor the original over the painterly version if choosing wall art.