Tilt-Shift made easy for Gimp

GIMP plug-in Toy 1.0: simple tilt-shift fakes from Alexandre Prokoudine on Vimeo.

Source : libregraphicsworld.org/blog/entry/toy-plug-in-for-gimp-simplifies-creating-tilt-shift-fakes

How to mimic a photo of a small model - while in fact it's a real photo of a normal sized house, people, boats etc ... The magic is in the focus blur and a feathered selection.

The plug-in (requires compilation) is available here at registry.gimp.org/node/25803

A gallery of Van Gogh's Paintings Get Tilt-Shifted (12 pics) - My Modern Metropolis

And a Photoshop tutorial to achieve the same effect www.tiltshiftphotography.net/photoshop-tutorial.php

Selvaria : sew it!

Selvaria from Valkyria Chronicles was once featured on this blog with the post on the Cerberus Project figurine.

Her full name is : Selvaria Bles and she is a 22 year old Brigadier General War Witch and one of the main antagonists in Valkyria Chronicles & Valkyria Chronicles 3.

This splendid character with silver hair had me stumble upon one of the most breathtaking cosplayer : Crystal Graziano - She really does Selvaria justice.

But then I found her various cosplay version of Cammy and then I really thought Crystal deserved to be featured in the blog. There was too many "serendipity".

Here's a few links to her website and interviews :
www.flickr.com/photos/preciouscosplay/
onpaperwings.deviantart.com/

www.facebook.com/people/Crystal-Graziano/
twitter.com/#!/itsprecioustime

My only regret is that Crystal doesn't have created a youtube account (yet).

But I won't despair : her popularity is going strong by the days, and her last shoot as "Black Widow" with the "Big white Bazooka" is a must-see.

Doom music a little extra

The previous post about Doom music revival (the original music were in MIDI format) contains a small list of website 
where you could listen to remix of this legendary tunes :

You can now add another source :
www.gamefront.com/files/4483399
for an additional bonanza of 42 MB of pure awesomeness remix of the original music  :

cdoomtheme.mp3
e1m1.mp3
e1m2.mp3
e1m3.mp3
e1m4.mp3
e1m5.mp3
e1m6.mp3
e1m7.mp3
e1m8.mp3
e1m9.mp3

And a very informative document by the author Sonic Clang (Brian Kline)

There has been so much talk over the years about how certain songs in Doom were inspired by other artists. Everyone knows “E1M1” was inspired by “No Remorse” from Metallica, and there are others. But what people don’t realize is that there are songs on the radio every single day that either sound like other songs or were inspired by them. People make such a big deal about the Doom songs sounding like a Metallica song, but it really isn’t uncommon at all.

Quick environment sketch with Gimp

Gimp 2.8 is about to be released soon (January 2012 ?!), and many people are waiting for the single window mode impatiently.

In the meantime, I've stumbled upon some nice Google+ posts involving some painting or photo-montage.

Painting environment composition is fun, and in a couple of hours, you can see result ... just experiment and try various brushes (the chaos and evolution set (by David Revoy) is recommended) ; one benefits of doing such exercise is learning to make good composition and harmonious sceneries, and how to set and use the light - because that's key.

These 2 videos might help :
YouTube - Quick environment sketch
www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGYqZZwzp18 (from idrawgirls.com/tutorials/2011/10/20/how-to-paint-landscape-mountain-river/)

Picture credit : Phillip Koops / Peileppe