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Artist Alma Hale explained how he used the computer program Photoshop to turn his digital photography into a collection of images that look like watercolor paintings. An exhibit of Hale’s work is currently running at the MAFAC gallery in Marshall.
MARSHALL — At first glance, the pictures on display at the Marshall Area Fine Arts Council gallery look like paintings. The landscapes have drops and splatters of color, and they even appear to have a rough texture like watercolor paper. But they’re all really digital photos, Alma Hale said.
An exhibit of Hale’s photography, titled “Fauxtoshop,” recently opened at the MAFAC gallery on Third Street. “Fauxtoshop” features photos Hale took and later manipulated to look like watercolor paintings. The exhibit runs through March 15.
“Fauxtoshop” looks at the relationship between digital and handmade art, Hale said.
“I’m always just fascinated with that interplay,” he said.
The style of digital artworks is something that has changed over the years along with the technology, he said.
“In the early days, we wanted our graphic design to look like it was done on the computer,” Hale said. “I learned (graphic design) with a T-square and an Exacto knife. So when the computer came along, it was really cool.”
Now, people creating art on a computer often want their images to look handmade, he said.
“Photoshop is an incredibly powerful program that can manipulate so much,” Hale said. “I’ve been teaching Photoshop all these years, and I thought, let’s take it to another level.”
Hale is a professor of art at Southwest Minnesota State University, and has past experience as a graphic designer. He’s also a photographer, who has been shooting photos since about 2013. Hale’s design and photography skills came together for the artwork in the exhibition.
“I have all these photographs that I’ve taken over the years, and I like to go back and revisit them and maybe re-edit them, because I am learning and changing all the time,” he said.
To give the photos in the exhibit a more handmade look, Hale used Photoshop actions – a series of pre-recorded commands – to edit the digital images. Hale has experimented with Photoshop actions that imitate different kinds of drawing and painting styles, from oil paints to architectural sketches. “There’s a lot of these that I’ve tried. My favorite, though, is the watercolor,” he said.
While Hale didn’t create the Photoshop action he used on the images in the exhibit, he used his own photos, and made additional modifications to them in the editing process. For example, he adjusted some images to make them brighter or clearer.
Hale said the edited photos look like the style of paintings he would want to make if he was working with watercolors.
“So, it’s not like this is some random program that I found. I’ve been looking for some time to find one that fits my personal style,” he said.
Hale said he didn’t have a particular theme in mind for the subject matter of his photos. “The only thing I knew is I wanted something with landscapes,” he said. There are images of mountains and canyons, scenes from Lake Superior, and even a line of stopped railroad cars in Wyoming.
Hale said he mainly created his photo edits for his own enjoyment, but it was still fun to get to share them with others.
“I keep telling my students I’m kind of a selfish artist. I do this for me, and I don’t really care too much if other people see it,” he said. “Maybe that’s why I’m in education instead of trying to make my living with this. But it is fun to show it, and share it.”
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