Maggie

Maggie is a friend of a friend, and the day they first came to my house, she brought this great bouquet of 19 roses.  I gave it back to her in permanent form through this picture, which I titled "20 Roses" (get it?).

Technical notes: The original is a badly lit snapshot (on-camera flash) that was hastily composed and shot during a party.  I wanted this one to look like an oil painting.  So first I cropped the picture and removed the distracting background.  I adjusted color and brightness, and applied a light watercolor filter.  Then came the hard part: using the smudge tool (and some burning and dodging) I simulated brushwork, much as I used to do when I manipulated Polaroids.  This is especially apparent on the face, but I also did it extensively to the flowers.  I textured the background, ran one more light watercolor filter, and was done.