Film Cameras and Painterly Effects

• If you shoot with film, you have more choice about what kind of cameras and lenses to use than if you only shoot digitally. Using a camera with an old, imperfect lens or even a plastic lens, as on a Holga camera, can soften the edges of your photograph and even distort the colors in interesting ways. Renowned photographer Sally Mann uses old, damaged lenses on her 8x10 camera that create a soft focus around the edges of the photograph. Pinhole cameras also create a softer, more painterly look to photographs. You can find old Brownie box cameras and try modern color film in them. The results can be surprising.
  
  

In the Darkroom

• Once you have a more painterly negative, the way you print it affects its look and style. Warm-tone paper creates a softer look for black and white photos, and you can tone the image for more effects. Many contemporary photographers use alternative processes, such as cyanotype, platinum-palladium and gum bichromate, which allow a more expressive use of a negative. Sensitizing your own paper for these processes gives you more choice of paper. You can choose a more textured paper for a more painterly look. Some 19th century gum bichromates, such as those of Heinrich Kuhn, are very hard to distinguish from lithographs or pastel drawings.
  
  

Digital Manipulations

• A simpler way to manipulate photographs these days is to digitize them, either by scanning or initial digital capture, and then alter the image in Photoshop or Corel Painter. In Photoshop, you can experiment first with different levels of saturation for your image, taking it from monochrome to super-saturated. Click on "Image," then "Adjustments" and then "Hue/Saturation," and move the sliders to experiment with different effects. Filters also allow almost unlimited possibilities. Click on "Filter" then "Filter Gallery" to see options. Simply adding a Gaussian blur can be all that is needed to make the photograph look like a painting. Similar options are also available in Corel Painter.
  
  

Printing the Digital File

• If you have an ink-jet printer, you can experiment with the many papers that are available for fine art photographers, from glossy papers that look like conventional photographs to textured watercolor papers. You can also try printing on art papers that are not specifically designed for ink-jet printers. Coating these papers with a digital ground before printing can sometimes give better results. Brush the ground onto the paper and let it dry before printing. These digital grounds can open up a whole range of new papers for artists, such as textured Japanese papers.