Photoshop Archives | Moss and Fog

Future

Adobe’s New ‘Super Resolution’ Can Double a Photo’s Sharpness and Quality

March 15, 2021 Future

Hollywood has been “enhancing” photos for so long, you’d be forgiven to not realize that this was all fake.

Shows like CSI and any garden-variety spy movie features scenes where grainy security footage is turned crystal clear with a few taps of a keyboard and the phrase “enhance”. It’s comically inaccurate, or at least was.

Adobe’s new ‘Super Resolution‘ tool is starting to actually make that enhancement a possibility. However, you need to start with a halfway decent photograph.

Using AI and machine learning, Adobe’s Photoshop tool can effectively double the resolution of an image, smartly improving even the smallest detail. The use for this new feature should be great for photographers wanting to zoom in and crop portions of their images, while keeping great clarity and detail. It’s also a huge help for putting hi-res images up on screens, which are increasingly 4K or even 8K in resolution.

And while we expect it’ll still be a while before that grainy security footage can be made perfectly clear, we’re sure it won’t stop moviemakers from continuing to push the limits of what actually is possible.

Via PetaPixel:

“The idea is to train a computer using a large set of example photos. Specifically, we used millions of pairs of low-resolution and high-resolution image patches so that the computer can figure out how to upsize low-resolution images.”

Adobe Photoshop

Art

Serene Surrealism by Kathrin Federer

February 12, 2021 Art

We love the sharp black and white contrast of Kathrin Federer’s designs, the way she combines elements to create huge scale. And we appreciate her ability to take us on a surreal journey, her work the combination of different photographic elements, combined to tell a visual story.

Though mostly working in a black and white context, Federer uses subtle color to immediately draw our eye, and add depth to the scenery. Mostly though, we’re drawn to the stillness and peace in her work, conveying a strong sense of serenity.

Check out her work on Instagram and her portfolio website.

Images used with artist’s permission.

Animals

Justin Peter’s Blending of Worlds

May 30, 2020 Animals

Skillfully using Photoshop to create digital collages that blend disparate scenes together, Justin Peters shows us entirely new realities. Horizons cleanly fade into foregrounds, human elements seamlessly become natural ones. Fascinating work, via Behance:

Animals

Martijn Schrijver Explores Lighthearted Surrealism With His Photo Manipulations

February 15, 2020 Animals

In our era of Photoshop, anything really is possible, visually. Take these photo manipulations by Martijn Schrijver, which push the world of animals and landscapes to new, often hilarious levels. From tropical to snowy, Schrijver gives us scenery that defies expectations, and description. Some of them work better than others, but it’s clear he’s deeply enjoying the work, which gives us a surreal look at the world around us. Via Inspiration Grid:

Art

More Surreal Moments by Erik Johansson

February 5, 2019 Art

Erik Johansson loves creating surrealistic imagery that feels both comical and also metaphorical for something deeper. His work is superbly created, with detailed, photorealistic accuracy, often using dramatically lit natural backgrounds. Here are a few more of his thought-provoking images, Via Behance:

surreal-moment-moss-and-fog-1 — All Above the Sky

surrealist imagery from Erik Johansson — Daybreaker

Animals

Animal and Human Eyes Merged

May 3, 2018 Animals

Created by Hungarian photographer Flora Borsi, “Animeyed“is a series that merges the eyes of animal and human. The result is startling, fascinating, and clever.

Flora at once captures the complex strength and fragility of the human psyche. She expertly visualises dark fantasies and atmospheric dreams, utilising the uncanny and clever metaphor, while unlocking what it means to think, feel, dream and express in the urban world. Her work often features the female body and she plays with hiding and revealing the eyes or face to leave only the feminine form, exploring questions of female representation and the relationship between body and self.

Via LaughingSquid:

Nature

Crimean Winter by Daniil Korzhonov

January 9, 2018 Nature

Via Fast Company Design

Is it a nuclear holocaust? The after effects of a massive asteroid striking earth? Nah. Just Eastern Europe in the winter. Crimea in wintertime with dramatic light looks almost otherworldly.

The photos are the work of Russia-based Daniil Korzhonov, who likes to tramp around the snow-flecked mountains and barren forests of the Ukrainian republic of Crimea, his Nikon D80 in hand. The soft-focus effect here, which makes some of the pictures look fake (like they were swiped from the set of yet another overproduced End Times blockbuster) is largely natural, Korzhonov tells us–just a product of bizarre weather.

“Mainly, my photos are taken in deep fog in the morning,” he writes in an email. “Crimea is a small peninsula at the Black Sea. So clouds cover the mountains in the morning. And my mission is to harvest the rare moments of sun coming through the cold winter clouds.” He does use some Photoshop (“a little bit of toning and color correction”), he says, but nothing unusual: “The heart [of the photographs] is the light in the scene.”

[Images courtesy of Daniil Korzhonov; h/t to Designboom]

Art

The Surreal Imagery of Erik Johansson

December 1, 2017 Art

We like surrealism at Moss and Fog. A lot. We dedicate a number of posts to it, and our Instagram features work from many artists doing surrealism. There’s something very escapist feeling about the genre, an easy way to feel transported to a type of dreamland. When we came across the image called “Full Moon Service” a few years back, we were impressed. But when we stumbled onto Erik Johansson’s full portfolio, we were blown away. His huge catalog of imagery is impressive on it’s own. But the time spent on post-production for each image in his collection is truly impressive. His imagery focuses on natural-settings, with people exploring surrealist surroundings, or happening upon strange and supernatural events. In one, a canoe rider comes to the edge of a lake that breaks apart into large shards of glass. He stares in amazement. In another, a figure awakes in bed to find that his sheets are actually ski slopes, and miniature people are skiing under the moonlight. The work is carefully crafted, and you can visit his “behind the scenes” to get a glimpse of how involved these photo shoots are. Really beautiful and inspiring work.

surrealism by Erik Johansson — Endless Reflections, 2015

Art

Shaping Nature

May 23, 2012 Art

The Land Art of Sylvain Meyer

Some nice”land art” by Sylvain Meyer, similar in nature (ha!) to Andy Goldsworthy’s work. More on Goldsworthy, the grandfather of land art, soon.

Via Colossal:

The Land Art of Sylvain Meyer land art installation art

Wonderful land art installations by French artist Sylvain Meyer who modifies wooded areas and landscapes to create various impermanent patterns, sculptures, and textures. Everything seen here was constructed without the use of Photoshop, even the mossy spider. Whoa! See much more over on Flickr. I’ve also finally crated a land art tag for Colossal. (via ruines humaines)