Love Art and Resolution

Play_Pretend · Mon 01/01/2007 05:08:20

Heyo all! I wanted your thoughts/opinions on this picture I made last night in Photoshop CS2...it's a surprise for my lady love, to show her how I feel when I'm with her. I was going to have it printed as a 16 x 24 poster and frame it originally, but apparently CVS, Walgreens and alladem suck at making their prints look like what's actually on the screen. It keeps coming out with weird blue highlights around everything. And for some reason my home HP Deskjet 3740 isn't printing any green, which is driving me nuts.

Anyways, whatcha think?

Evil · Mon 01/01/2007 07:25:13

The crop is high. You've got some nice space from the top to the heads, but the bottom is cropped right at the feet. The saturation is really high, and it kind of burns my eyes.

i k a r i · Mon 01/01/2007 12:23:17

Maybe you can take something from this edit, maybe not, I hope you do

It was done VERY fast, you should think how to make the second leg, and find an alternative colour, or desaturate it..
Maybe you're trying to achieve an electric, or energetic feeling from your graphic, but still doesnt look very nice to me... $:-\$

Mr Flibble · Mon 01/01/2007 17:01:38

I really prefer the original, bright blue and green one. I could instantly see that it was portraying two people in love. I actually find the browny edit quite unexciting, it doesn't really suggest the sort of, eclectic, powered-by-either-love-or-plutonium super happy that the first one has.

And the way that the forms of the people are vague, but clear when you look for them, just adds a lot more to it. Again, very passionate and untamed. Which is good.

As for printing.. you could just be low on ink in your printer?
Or you could try some kind of professional printing company. It sounds like you already did try professionals, though.

DoorKnobHandle · Mon 01/01/2007 17:19:46

One personal thing: it not only looks like two people in love, but more like two people actually making love to me - well, not making love to me, but you see what I mean there... I think, that the man's hands that reach down to her butt give the image that impression, rather than appearing like a common hug. As well as its drawn, will it not maybe feel a bit strange for your loved-one to receive an image that apparently shows how you feel with her and then give her this image if you look at it from this way?

The above may be way to personal to you or just nonsense altogether, it really depends on your relationship. I just meant to give you this information in case you didn't thought about this yet. Hope you can take it!

Postmodern_Boy · Mon 01/01/2007 17:44:25

Was the file you sent to the printers 72 or 300 Dpi?Ã,Â 300 dpi is needed for a professional looking print.Ã,Â Did you ask what file type your printers prefer?

I also like the bright green and blue of the original better than the edit. The original colors give a 1960s pop art or op art feel to it that I think works well with the image.

MashPotato · Mon 01/01/2007 20:27:45

Quote from: dkh on Mon 01/01/2007 17:19:46
One personal thing: it not only looks like two people in love, but more like two people actually making love to me - well, not making love to me, but you see what I mean there...

I agree with dkh here... if your intention is to make it look as though the woman is leaping into the man's arms, I would raise man's arms a bit ^_^. In any case, I like the abstraction and energy of this painting.

As for the printing, I'm not 100% sure on this, but most printers (especially professional printers) use CMYK colour instead of RGB. I converted your picture to CMYK, and saw the problem you were describing (I think):

RGB:

CMYK:

(I had to take a screenshot of the CMYK one because saving in that format in jpeg makes the files ridiculously huge)
For many pictures the difference between the two is not that large, but since the colours you are using are so bright and vibrant, that may have caused a problem--I'm really not sure.

Good luck with printing ^_^

Play_Pretend · Mon 01/01/2007 20:47:19

Wow, thanks for all the responses...basically, the reason it was in green and blue is because those are "our" colors, I'm green, she's blue, and whenever I make something artistic and romantic for her, I always mix the two.

(Hey, that almost rhymed, although the meter's off.) I left it bright because we're supposed to be sort of made out of flame, although I guess I didn't really do that as much to her part as to mine. I just discovered the Smudge tool.

I wonder if maybe the brightness setting on my monitor is lower or something.

We're not actually making love in the pic (although it is supposed to be suggested), we just have a romantic thing we do where I carry her around like that, a walking, dancing hug. (Those of you with diabetes, please leave the room before this gets too sweet.)

I guess her legs would be around behind my back in real life for that, call it artistic license.

Every time I tried to print it at home, it pretty much came out entirely in shades of blue...the green was just a really pale blue, and the blue was a very dark blue. I set it up to Maximum DPI (I think it said it was like 1200 or 1400 or something), and while it made it come out really smoothly, it was still the wrong color. My printer's ink level shows when it's printing, and it *says* it has equal parts blue, yellow and red, but who knows...it was about 30 or 50 bucks, so I know it's low-end.

Maybe I should try picking up a photo quality cartridge, instead of just a standard color one?

I think I actually caused a fuss at CVS yesterday, because after the do-it-yourself kiosk prints came out so badly, I didn't want the employees to keep them in the "customer rejected" pile behind the desk, (since, as you say, it can easily be interpreted as a picture of lovemaking) so I walked off and threw them away in the bathroom trash. As I was walking off I suddenly heard codes being called over the PA system, I bet they probably thought I was stealing them.

Play_Pretend · Mon 01/01/2007 20:50:16

Ha! I just read back through again..."love-or-plutonium".

Sounds like the name of a rock band.

And yeah, we have a very passionate, very energetic relationship. It'll be three years one week from today!

Mr Flibble · Tue 02/01/2007 14:59:35

Oh that's great man! I'm really happy for you, it's so nice to think of two people still very much in love, even after 3 years.

Hmm.. now, is it possible to convert the image to CMYK (there is an option for it in PS/PSP) and then alter the colours to be bright again, and then print it?