Mom told me, “If you can't say something nice don't say anything at all.” Well, that about sums up January this year.
HOW TO: “Orton Imagery” translated for GIMP
To get February off on the right foot, I thought I would show you a new photomanipulation technique, and give instructions for achieving the technique with the GIMP. This technique is named after a Canadian photographer named Michael Orton. I have just become aware of his work and I like it a lot. Some of his work with long exposures is very nice, and it reminds me of a couple of mine. (His timed exposures are of water and such, and mine of dogs, but never-the-less...)
I found out about Michael Orton from an article by Darwin Wiggett on Nature Photographers on-line magazine. It is instructions for Photoshop in that article that I am translating to GIMP.
Step 0: Use a copy of your original file.
Duplicate the background Layer ->Duplicate Layer
Open Layers Dialog Dialogs->Layers [CTRL]+L
Approximate overexposure In the mode drop down of the Layers Dialog, choose "Screen".
Merge the layers Right-Click the Screen Layer and choose Merge Down
Duplicate the layer again Right-Click the Background layer in the Layers Dialog and choose Duplicate Layer
Blur the top layer From the menu on the Image window, choose Filter->Blur->Gaussian blur...
Approximate a "slide sandwich" Historically this step is taken by taking two slides and putting them together in a single slide mount; Change the Mode in the Layers dialog to Multiply
Save your image.