Spring Flowers

I was trying out the new tutorials at Cottage Arts for Masks and Gradients. Even though I use a lot of masks and sometimes gradients I find that I always learn something new when reading through tuts. You can find them here if you are interested. If you're interested in the supplies I used check them out here.

Here's my technique for achieving this look - The photo was enlarged to fill the whole page, placed above the Photo Mask 3 and duplicated. The top layer was blended to luminosity, the layer directly above the mask to screen. I added a layer above with the Blanc De Noir Paper 09 adding a Gradient Map of Magenta/Yellow (included with PS CS3 - Color Harmonies 2) Opacity set to 99% Fill set to 43%, a mask was added and the center brushed out with a soft brush