Chic Old

I love old things and because I do, I look for them everywhere.  But unfortunately, so many of them cost so much!  Today however, there is a resurgence of things that look old but really arn't!  Who cares as long as  you can now have the look but not the cost.  That is if you don't count the cost of the materials to make them look old.  Seems like there is a buck to be made at every turn and I am usually the one that pays the buck.

 But I am here to tell you that just about anyone can distress things.  Take a look at the photo that I have started to work on, and and you will see a process that you could take on and perhaps make some of your new photos look old.  

I got this idea while living in Ireland some years ago.  A man who I will never meet bought a home in England and was renovating it.  He said that he spent the first night in his newly found find even though the place was gutted and there was a dead dog in the basement.  Yes what some of us won't do for the history and the feel of the place.  Well to make a long story short he went out and bought old paintings and filed the place.  He desired to have it restored to the Victorian spender that it once was and so he sought out the things that reminded him of that time era. He did not care about the history or some paper trail that proved he acquired an origional.. who ever,  he just wanted the feel.  He even said that he did not even know his ansestors so he made up  stories to go with the paintings.  Wow.   I am after  the feel too.  I don't care if the things that I choose have been photographed in the year 2008 or in 1808 just so they have a particular look and when you walk in the room you feel that time slip.  Slippage is a major selling point. 

Now I work in Photoshop CS2 as some of you may know (all two of you) and you just take your favorite photo and do a selective color (taking most of the color out but leaving the ones that you favor in) In this case I left yellows and oranges and reds but desaturated the greens and blues. That gives it a feel of time silppage.  I then went to my handy filter package, I got from Alien Skin and used the rust (heavy) on a separate layer.  Then I slowly erased the rust leaving just a bit to give that dirty and old look of perhaps a mirror or a painting that has been less cared for, possibly left up in the attic for 100's of years. Then another filter to distress the edges. (you won't want to do that in all your endeavors I used it just to show an old photo). Make sure you don't make the distressing the main focus in your art the photo should be the focus at all times.  Just remember why you love those old photos.  The interest that the flaws bring out. Enjoy and remember there is more than one way to distress your photos and this is just one way.  Above all be creative .  Have Fun!