Dog Days

Device Model/Make: Olympus Stylus 700Focal Length: 6.5 mm (note: compact camera, not APS-C or 35mm)F number: 3.4Shutter: 1/13sISO: 400This is the obligatory portfolio picture with an "artistic color filter effect" as well as an artificially rendered shallow depth of field. I've had a bit of success using normally lackluster pocket cameras on timers to get decent pictures of sleeping pets, and this is one such picture I thought had a clearly defined foreground, subject, and background that I could mess around with in post. It was also slightly grainy at ISO 400 so I went to black and white to average out the RGB noise that was present in the picture.With a base layer to start with, I cut out different areas of the picture in Photoshop that corresponded roughly to different distances from the camera. The floor in front of Spike was left as a single layer, I just went over it with a blur tool by hand to account for varying degrees of fuzziness. The dog's face was left intact, and his chest and paws had one pass with a blur filter. The background had two passes, and the edges softened with a small radius fuzzy eraser so that it would blend more smoothly with the edges of fur. In hindsight, I think this would look better in a widescreen-ish format...