GIMP baby step 5: retouching images
You may have seen this nice little image from the Lick Observatory home page. My fifth venture into gimpdom involved "messing with" this image in various ways.
Would you believe me if I said this was a postcard from the 1920's that I found in an old book? Sorry, the Shane telescope (foreground) hadn't been built yet. This is a Script-fu product (the "Old Photo" filter and the "Coffee Stains" filter).
And then there's this pastel sketch, er, well, it's another gimp product actually. I only wish I could sketch that accurately. Edge detect plus image invert plus careful touchup with air brush, fuzzy brush, etc.
But why stop there? Why not move Mount Hamilton, telescopes and all, to the Southwestern desert? OK, the lightning still needs a little work :-) This one was a long learning experience. Briefly, "magic wand" selection, feathered selections; clone painting; colour balance adjustment; HSV adjustment; hand painting.