Cajsa Lilliehook covers the best in virtual world screenshot art and digital painting
Lori Matthews’ photostream is full of stunning photos, mostly of her avatar, such as this picture called “I Miss You” with a poignant quote from Lemony Snicket. This is a lovely example of the Rule of Thirds, the avatar is centered two-thirds from the left and the bed to pillow “horizon” is one-third from the bottom. It’s a nice reminder that there are horizons, then there are “horizons.”
I decided to feature Lori when I saw the following picture, one that prompted me to ask her how she did it.
“Will You Still Love Me” features a quote from the Lana Del Ray song. This picture stopped me cold while I was browsing her photostream. For a moment, I marveled at what an amazing job she did making her avatar look like her real self. Then it occurred to me this might not be a real-life photo and the groups it was in confirmed it is a Second Life photo. But what made it so realistic? The age that shows in her skin, of course. Most avatars are youthful or extremely aged. Not only that, but this skin looks like her other skins, just older. So what’s the secret, did she use an overlay to add the textures of age.
The truth is almost too easy:
“It was one of the easiest photos I have taken and not by any skill of my own. I owe it all to the creators of the Lelutka Erin head. The HUD has a wonderful wrinkle feature. I just used it with my normal skin. I turned my settings to Ultra to take the photo in order for the wrinkles to show up. After that, all I did was change it to black and white for even more contrast. That's really all there was to it.” Wow, suddenly I want to shop!
I love “Glamour” which comes with a great quote from Dita von Teese. It’s a bit more editorial, with her looking away so the focus is on her accessories. She also makes interesting use of bokeh. I am not bokeh snob, and use it sometimes myself. I love how she used it in this picture without regard to reality, but only around her upper head taking our focus away from her hair, almost camouflaging her hair. There’s something cheeky and fun about using bokeh this way.
So be sure to check out Lori Matthews’ photostream for fabulous portraits and other pictures that have a touch of romance and a clear love of beauty.
See all of Cajsa's Choices here. Follow Cajsa on Flickr, on Twitter or on her blog.
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