On Creative Filters and Special Effects

The Library. Denver, Colorado, 2013

Last Thursday, at the Flatirons Photo Club, Mark S. Johnson gave a wonderful presentation about a program called Filter Forge. Mark is a wonderful teacher and presenter (his website HERE is loaded with all kinds of free and great Photoshop and other video tutorials) and his demonstration of the artistic possibilities and the power of Filter Forge was impressive.

Which leads me to today’s “good news-bad news” thought about the myriad creative options available to today’s photographer…

The good news: There are thousands of potential creative paths for you to explore with your photography.

The bad news: There are thousands of potential creative paths for you to explore with your photography.

Yes, never in the history of photography have we had such power over how we can manipulate our images. In the case of Filter Forge, as Mark pointed out, users contribute their own designs for creative filters which you are then free to use (once you purchase the program) and there are now nearly 10,000 different filters to choose from. And this is just one program! Then you have Topaz, Nik (now by Google), Adobe, Apple and so many others hard at work with their own software constantly pushing the frontiers of your creative options.

The problem is that you may have so many paths available to you that you may lose your way in the wilderness and never settle on a personal style that works for you. You could simply spend a lifetime experimenting…lost in the deep, dark forest.

Ay…what to do, what to do…

I think it all goes back to that complex, introspective journey we all need to make to understand and discover our own personal style. Artistic photography is really an exercise in introspection after all. (See my previous blog entry on this subject HERE.) Do the self-examination first, then go look for the programs and plug-ins that will be most helpful in communicating your visual message. Naturally, one should play around and experiment–in the process, you just might come across an interesting effect that could become your personal trademark! But first, give a lot of thought to who you are and what you want to say with your images–that is the first, most difficult step.

So, have fun–play!–but be wary. Don’t get so caught up in all those thousands of filters and special effects that you lose your way.