A New Poster As Free Digital File

If you have not been a follower of my other blog, "Original Art Studio", you may not know that in 2008 my thirty-six year old daughter was diagnosed with lung cancer.  I wrote about my experience accompanying her on the journey from the shock of diagnosis, through major thoracic surgery, through recovery, to her body/mind/spirit adjustment to this new and alarming reality in her life.  (You can read those posts on Original Art Studio here and here.)


One of my (and also my daughter's) coping strategies in any crisis is to learn as much as possible about all the related variables so that I/we can make informed choices and at least have some sense of understanding, even if during the crisis I/we have no sense of control.  So once over the initial shock of the diagnosis and surgery, my daughter and I did a lot of research about cancer and what science knows about its causes. 


As a result of that research, my daughter has made some radical changes to her life.  (My husband and I have too!)   She had removed herself from a toxic marriage just prior to her diagnosis and was still working at recognizing and releasing the toxic emotions that had (in my therapeutic opinion) grown out of control into a a tumor which symbolized how little room to breathe there was in that relationship.  (Her cancerous tumor blocked 98% of one of her bronchial tubes.  The blockage was in the part of the bronchial tube that is inside the lung.)  After surgical removal of the tumor her challenge, as she saw it, was to remove all other possible toxins in her life.  BTW she was never a smoker so that was not one of the toxins she had to remove.


Two books (out of dozens) that were pivotal in her change to toxin-free living were:

The China Study by T. Colin Campbell, Ph.D.,  and

AntiCancer:  A New Way of Life by David Servan-Schreiber, M.D., Ph.D.


Research on the internet led her to in-depth medical papers about her particular form of cancer ("carcinoid", a neuro-endocrine form of cancer - the same form of cancer that afflicted Steve Jobs although his carcinoid tumor was first discovered in his pancreas, which is considered much more dangerous).  When she meets new doctors, they invariably assume she is a physician due to her comprehensive knowledge and understanding of the topic.  As well as her full time jobs of parenting two beautiful girls and as a business professional, she manages a hot-line for her type of cancer here in the province of Quebec.


Add in my background in psychology and education - and my recent dabbling in Photoshop - to all our research and I decided to create a poster to share some of our newly acquired information and new anti-cancer lifestyle.   Whether you want to use the information to try to prevent cancer (as I am), or to fight cancer if you have already been diagnosed (as my daughter is), I believe you can benefit from this poster.  Perhaps it will motivate you to do your own research and make the simple life changes that help make your body/mind/spirit an anti-cancer environment.


As with the poster I recently created on Depression (you can download the digital file for it here or from my sidebar), I do not want to be involved in printing, packaging, profiting from, or shipping this as a tangible product, so I am offering this poster to you for free as a digital file.  It was designed in an 18 inch by 24 inch file, 300 dpi resolution.  You then have the choice of how you want to print it yourself. 



You are welcome to download the digital file for non-commercial use only.  This means you may not sell (or re-gift it in large quantities) as either a paper poster or as a digital file.  If you post it on your blog, I ask that you make a link to this blog for your readers to make their download here.

Download this free digital file by clicking HERE.

While no regimen or lifestyle changes can guarantee anything, the recommendations in this poster can certainly help you clean up your physical and emotional environs - if that is your wish.  My primary hope is that it motivates you to think seriously about the effects of what you absorb into your body/mind/spirit and do your own research to determine how you want to best live your one life.

BTW, my daughter is doing very well now.  She is a  now a vegetarian who also tries to avoid dairy, eggs, sugar and wheat.  She is also a runner and in the best shape of her life - not that she was ever visibly out of shape. 

While she is exhibiting no outward signs of recurrence, she is currently, at her doctor's request, undergoing a new round of scans and tests to verify that she is cancer free three years after surgery.  This new round of tests is a concrete reminder that once you have cancer it can hover over your life like a dark cloud.  Taking life one day a time, loving and appreciating every moment you have while you have it, is the best strategy for not letting the on-going threat of cancer be a toxin itself in your life.  Byron Katie's book, Loving What Is helped and continues to help us absorb the emotional reality of having cancer touch our lives.

I hope you will take advantage of this free digital download, perhaps print it and give the printed poster it to those who might find it of use. 

Good health and a very happy new year to you all. 

... fill your holidays with delight ...

Our dreams of a white Christmas came true!  We're now enjoying a pristine winter wonderland that just makes the celebrations perfect.

It's very cold, but grandkids, step-grandkids, uncle and Maya the dog ventured outside for a bit of exercise and merriment.

Hope your holiday celebrations are full of loving connections and joy.

take a break ... grab a free texture!

Hi my lovelies ... are you in the middle of baking, shopping, wrapping, planning, decorating, etc?  Or are you one of those amazing (but infuriating! :-) people who is on top of everything because you start preparing for the holidays in August?

If you're like me, you are in the former category rather than the latter and thus very busy right now.  And here I sit ... procrastinating ... in front of the computer ... looking for a little break from it all.  Is that what you are doing too?

Okay ... let's make our procrastination worthwhile ... here's a fabulous free texture for you!  I've called it "YesterYear" because it is full of vintage possibilities.  (If you don't want the frame part of it, simply use the bounding boxes to pull it off the edge of your photograph.)

Download pdpa YesterYear texture, HERE.

Okay, enough procrastination, back to holiday preparations for me! 

If we don't connect again before the new year, please know I wish you all the delights of the season and a very healthy, happy 2012.

Copyright still applies to these textures after purchase or free download, as stand alone articles. I only agree to forego my design ownership rights once the texture is incorporated into your photographic or artistic work. Once the texture is a part of your work, you are free to use it in any of your personal or commercial endeavors. Please respect international copyright laws and do not claim these as your own, try to resell or gift them as is, or use them as the basis on which you create your own derivative textures.

A Christmas Gift For You

Hi my Lovelies, your 2011 Christmas gift has arrived. 

Wrapped with love and appreciation, it contains two fabulous fine art textures for you.

One is a texture for all seasons.  I call it Cinnamon.  It has many different personalities depending on how you choose to blend it.  Hope you love it as much as I do.

For your free download of pdpa Cinnamon texture, click HERE.

The second texture in your gift package imparts a wonderful feel to a photograph. 

I have called it Backlight.  Hope you can use it somewhere in your artwork.

For your free download of pdpa Backlight texture, click HERE.

May each and every one of you have a safe, joyful holiday. 

Most of all, may you find yourself surrounded by loved ones ...

and ... a few photographic opportunities with photo-art potential ...  ;-)

(I'll be back before 2011 comes to an end

so that I can wish you a happy 2012!)

Copyright still applies to these textures after purchase, as stand alone articles. I only agree to forego my design ownership rights once the texture is incorporated into your photographic or artistic work. Once the texture is a part of your work, you are free to use it in any of your personal or commercial endeavors. Please respect international copyright laws and do not claim these as your own, try to resell or gift them as is, or use them as the basis on which you create your own derivative textures.

Thank You To Gwynnie B. Designs!

Look at what arrived in the mail today!  I was the lucky entrant, in  Gwynnie B. Designs' giveaway a couple of weeks ago, and won this book entitled "Art & Fear - An Artist's Survival Guide" by David Bayles & Ted Orland.


We all, as artists, find ourselves staring at the blank page, the empty canvas, the blank digital file and wondering if we can transfer our ideas from mind to matter.  Each artistic effort is an encounter with the unknown.  The unknown can evoke fear.   The question is - how to manage fear when it arises.  Can't wait to read this book to find the answer to that question!

Gwynnie B. is a person of diverse talents, from jewellery-making to photography, to art in so many forms, to design.  If you have not yet had the pleasure of visiting Gwynnie B. Designs go THERE right now!  She is a wise, wild, wonderful woman with a wicked sense of humor and such a keen sense of design.  Gwynnie will delight and inspire you ... AND ... if you are lucky ... one day she may send you a book! 

Thank you Gwynnie for this timely gift!

Defeat Depression Poster, A Free Digital Download

Hey Everyone ... are you crazy busy?  Of course you are.  It's that time of year! 

It's also the time of year when many of us can experience some form of depression.

As a psychotherapist I spent years helping people deal with depression.  Soooo ... I thought why not pair up my knowledge of the topic with my modest digital-editing skills and make a poster that could possibly help many? 

I do not want to profit from this poster.  Nor do I want to spend a lot of  time or money printing, packaging and shipping actual paper posters ... so I am offering it to you as a free, high resolution, digital download.  Once you download, you can print it on the quality and size of paper you choose, frame it or not, etc.  The poster was designed in an 18" X 24" format.

This poster Strategies To Defeat Depression is for your personal use only.  Copyright still applies after your download.  You cannot sell it, or make products featuring it (or portions of it) that you market commercially.  To use this copyrighted digital file for profit constitutes theft. 

Feel free to give this poster (once you have it printed) as your personal gift to family members, friends, schools, teachers, guidance counselors, etc., or direct them here to make their own download.  It is my hope that it can point the way to relief from depression for many - especially at this sometimes difficult time of year. 

For your free download of this digital file click HERE. 

To see other posters (designed par moi) go to my new

PixelDustArtShoppe Store at Zazzle, or to my Pixel Dust Posters
page under my header.

photo embellishment

Sharing with Lisa Gordon's The Creative Exchange.

Photo Art Friday, Dec. 9th - 11th

Welcome to our last Photo Art Friday for 2011. 

We began this past September and have already enjoyed fourteen photo-art showcases!  Many of you have been showcasing here right from the start and I so appreciate your weekly link-ups!  Those of you who have just discovered us lately, we are thrilled to have you join us!  Thank you all!

This week's suggested theme is to share a photograph, processed to look like a piece of art, that touches on holiday preparations.

I've pulled out our boxes of ribbons, bows, ornaments, decorations etc., all of which were patiently waiting for their chance to make our home sparkle and shine.  We moved away from traditional Christmas colors several years back and decorate now with pale turquoise and orange.  Of course, all the other colors still make an appearance because we kept our special older ornaments. 

Here are some pics of our turquoise and orange bows gathered into collages:

Same collage processed in a soft B&W.

Processed to look a little more vintage.

Our next Photo Art Friday will be January 6 - 8, 2012! 

How about if we make the theme

"one of my very best photo-art edits of that great year, 2011".

May each and every one of you have a safe, warm, loving, connected holiday season with many moments of peace and joy. 

I'll keep an eye out for your posts and will surely send out a few myself before 2011 turns to 2012.  Keep your eye out for some unique, new freebies that will make their debut before the new year.

Three Free Textures for YOU

It's that busy time of year.  Are you in the midst of all your holiday preparations?  Hope you haven't forgotten to take a photograph or two of your pre-holiday activities!  That's our theme for this week's, soon-to-arrive Photo Art Friday. 

The theme can be as broad as you want to stretch it - so could include shopping, traffic, people walking with their parcels, children writing to Santa, baking, decorating, gift-wrapping, card writing, etc. etc.  Can't wait to see what you all come up with!

This is a collage featuring two textures I'm about to share with you and three applications of them to one photo.  Don't hold me to it, but I believe they were blended in Hard Light, Color Burn and Difference.  You can, of course, blend these textures with your photograph in Soft Light, Screen or Lighter Color for a more desaturated look if that is what you prefer.

Let me introduce you to pdpa Vintage Wine Label texture.  It's sure to add a vintage feel to your photographs.  You can download the high resolution version by clicking HERE.

And this is pdpa Intensify texture - and that is exactly what it will do for your photos.  Don't worry it is not too strong!  Try it in all the blend modes.  I love the painterly effect you get along with the intensified colors.  You can download the high resolution version of Intensify HERE.

And for those of you who like a texture with a little French script on it, here's one for you:

This is pdpa Lover's Lament texture.  It will not, however, cause any 'lament' when you apply it to the right photograph.  Download the free, high resolution version HERE.

Can't wait to see what you create with these three great textures.  Enjoy!

See you at our virtual gallery showcase on Friday (Thursday evening for you earlybirds!).

... a berry beautiful tree ...

It's a grey early morning here in the region of Montreal.  The air seems to be laden with moisture, but the temps are not cold enough to turn that moisture to snow.  With global warming and all the crazy fluctuations in weather, it seems we have to keep our fingers crossed for a white Christmas.  I've got my fingers and toes crossed!

The photograph below was taken in late October.  The tree had shed its leaves to reveal its branches heavy with glorious berries.  I'm sure the birds were feasting on them throughout November.  The photo has been processed in RadLab adding two or three of its 'treatments'.

I'm sharing this with the always gracious Lisa's "The Creative Exchange".  Do visit her site to enjoy all the amazing submissions by photographers who link up there every Monday.  She is also featuring a great giveaway this week!

December: the month for giving

Hi Everyone!

Have you seen all the fabulous photo art linked up for this weekend's Photo Art Friday?  Do take a look and leave a little comment love.  I'll be catching up on commenting tomorrow as I'm busy preparing a family birthday get-together for our son's up-coming 31st birthday.  We've pushed the party up a week to today. 

Do you have close friends and relatives with birthdays in late December or early January?  My husband's birthday is December 26th!  There should be some law against babies being born on that date.  Few enter into happy birthday celebrations with relish the day after Christmas.  Poor guy usually has his birthday bumped to another date.  And we've bumped my son's birthday celebration up a week too.   Good thing they are such agreeable, easy-going guys. 

BTW, my parents were married December 25th.  My father born Jan. 1st and then I marry a man who was born on December 26th and have a son born December 11th, and a grandaughter and myself born in January.  December and January are very busy months!   Oh well, we have all survived and everyone has been duly feted and appreciated.

Since I'm in present-giving, appreciation mode, here's one for you.  Enjoy!

Download pdpa Holy Grunge texture by clicking HERE.

Photo Art Friday, Dec. 2nd - 4th

Hello my lovelies.  It's December!!!  Where did 2011 go?  The older one gets, the faster time flies, don't you find?  Well, let's lift our last-month-of-the-year spirits with our virtual showcase of fabulous photo art.

I have to say that last week, with the Thanksgiving holiday in The States, I expected fewer participants.  However, the numbers stayed much the same as previous weeks.  Thank you to each and every one of you who participated.  I so admire all your work.

This week the challenge is to post an image featuring work with a tool, method, style that we have been wanting to try.

For my part, I conducted an experiment transforming one very ordinary photograph into as many pieces of different photo art as I could.  In all, I have twenty pieces of 'art' from this one photo, but don't worry, I'll only share a few with you here.

SOOC photo of statue in front of a Chinese/Thai restaurant we frequent on occasion.

 Still original photograph, but cropped to highlight hands and torso of the statue.

First edit uses one of my single textures, similar to "Sandy Edges" in my Texture Singles Shoppe,       rotated 90 degrees.  Blended in Overlay 90%.

 None of these edits were assisted with RadLab or Topaz.  Only my textures and PSE Adustments were made to create these effects.

Don't recall and didn't record which texture was used, but I can see it was processed in Difference.  When I use the Difference blend mode I rarely reduce the opacity below 85%.  To do so makes you lose the special Difference effect.  If your image needs more light, do a levels adjustment.  No levels masking was used to remove any of the texture.  Difference blend mode seemed to magically put the bronze into the lines on the statue!

Another texture, another piece of photo art, different than the ones before.

Here Art-Easy Deeply Engrained texture is blended with the photo in that good old Difference blend mode at 100% opacity.

Here I superimposed one of the already edited versions of the cropped statue on a photograph of a church for a little different effect.

Here I use one of my Art Easy textures (as yet unnamed and unreleased). Blend mode Linear Light at 90% opacity.

I hope this post encourages you to try many different things with the same photograph.  You can easily produce very different and unique pieces from one little photo.

NOTE:    Next week will be our last Photo Art Friday for 2011.   We will resume our gallery vernissages in 2012 on January 6th.  Not to worry, I will post some little reminders beforehand.

For next week, how about if we make a piece of photo art that has something to do with the bustle of seasonal preparations: shopping, wrapping presents, preparing xmas cards, decorating your home, etc. - anything to do with preparations for Christmas or Hanukkah celebrations.  Perhaps you will be able to use it for greeting cards you create for next year.

While you're here, grab a free decorative button for your sidebar.  There are now more than twenty to choose from.