PEN & INK TECHNIQUE Continued

Clive R. Haynes FRPS

'Colour Blending' by choosing a suitable colour blend mode for a copy of the 'Background' layer

The starting Point
 
Merge the 'Threshold', 'Curves' and Background copy layers by switching off the eye icon on the Background (bottom) layer and make the 'Background Copy' the active layer.
Next...
Activate the uppermost layer
Go to Layers > Merge Visible

Name the newly merged layer 'Pen & Ink' to identify it
V6 do this via Layers > Layer Properties and type in the 'Name' box. > click OK
V7 do this by double clicking on the name of the layer, then type in the new name

 
Make a copy of the Background layer by dragging it on to the New Layer icon then drag it to the top of the layer stack
Severely blur this Background copy via Filter > Gaussian Blur > 20 or above

Change the Blend Mode of the Background Copy layer from 'Normal' to 'Hard Light' (experiment with other Blend Modes too)

Reduce the opacity of the copy layer if required

Layer order and blend setting
Above: Layer order after naming 'Pen & Ink' layer, placing Background Copy at top of stack and choosing 'Hard Light' as the 'Blend Mode' (set to 93%)
Pen & Ink version combined with blurred original image ('Hard Light' blend)
As you can see the technique is very malleable and lends itself to numerous combinations, having whet your appetite I hope that you'll try these ideas and experiment with your own variations