can recommend getpaint.net as the easiest windows version of this. it’s not as robust as photoshop or spits on the ground GIMP but it’s waaay easier to use.
The trick with any collage stuff is layers. The two main things that are gonna make a digital collage pop are:
Layer transparency. Change this so something doesn’t totally obscure what’s beneath it
Blend modes. These will let layers affect each other in ways other than just obscuring. Play around with the different options to see what they do. Here’s a tutorial for paint.net specifically: Blend Modes
You can also use gradients to make a layer partially transparent. I also suggest messing with things like turning an image black and white and making it an XOR blend mode (i think) to get weird negative effects. And just generally messing with the hue.
Also try sharpening ( Effects>Photo>Sharpen) something like, 5 times in a row to make it real crunchy. Or you can save it as a reallllly low quality JPG and reimport it to get weird effects that way. Or up the saturation to insane levels! Or Posterize something so it’s only able to use a few colors! Really just use any effect to make something obviously Incredibly Digital and it’s gonna look cool imo.
yeah this is right afaik, i’m not much for printing but the math checks out. if you really wanna print to the edges of something it should have some “bleed” i.e. dead zones around the edges where you don’t care about the content, but it still fits in with the image. this is because printing is imprecise, and it’s always unclear exactly where an image is going to be cropped.
BUT if that’s not the goal then i wouldn’t worry about it.
I have composed rough collages before just using Windows snipping tool and paint, but I’ll try out Cania’s recommendations. I’m looking forward to putting something together for this tomorrow morning. 600 x 1200 works for me!
i mean also use whatever tools you are familiar with, im not anyone’s boss. if perfect is the enemy of good, then good is the enemy of getting shit done. also i don’t plan on making something even remotely good lol
One other thing that’s probably too obvious to mention is that it would be best to use PNG rather than JPG for these because if you combine two images and one is a JPG it’s already been compressed once. You’re compressing it a second time if you again save the combined image as a JPG.
(Though I do sometimes like Internet images that have gone through multiple iterations of screenshotting and recompression. It can be a style in itself.)
Spending a few days at the hospital with my kid (non emergency) this week so I probably can’t do anything until this weekend, I apologize in advance for holding things up
I know there’s probably no rush but I haven’t had much time to do collage between illness and work. Hoping to get started soon as I have some ideas for the prompts I’ve got
To everyone worried about completing this in a timely manner or at all, please know that I have also been struggling. Unlike other rounds, I can’t really work on this during a lunch break.
But! I had a lot more success today when I started cutting up magazines and playing with the shapes. I realized too late that I didn’t have a glue stick and the whole thing fell on the ground, but I made progress!
When I got my theme, I had a good idea of what my panel should look like, and I feel that I have portrayed this vision as well as could be hoped. It may be a bit of a head-scratcher to the casual passerby, though.
That took a little longer than I’d intended, but now that I have some practice with these tools, I think my next panel should go faster!
(Also I am saving the web address of every image I’m employing in this endeavor.)
I am setting myself a perhaps unwise creative limitation of only using material that came through my letterbox. Quickly learning the texture and creative possibilities of junkmail.
If you want to continue working on pieces from previous games, you’re welcome to do so. If you don’t want to work on those old pieces anymore, you can send me a message and I’ll take a crack at it.
For March, we’re returning to the original rules from the first game. No gimmicks, just haiku-couplet-haiku.
As always, if you would like to participate, simply respond to this thread with a theme.
