Sharpening the pencil

I've been fortunate enough to have the opportunity to take on a wide variety of projects as of late.  Some, of course, are better than others but I can honestly say each has touched on a skill (and consequently made me sharpen said skill) that I've learned over the past 20 years.  The one I'll share with you below is a skill which hasn't been exercised in quite some time.  I had to really go back and sharpen my pencil for this one. 

The image above is not my design.  Did you read that?  I'm am in no way claiming this as my design.  It belongs to a very talented designer from Fort Worth.  My role is purely after the fact, behind the scenes, a means to an end.  

My client is in the midst of building this super cool duplex atop a hill in Oak Cliff, Dallas, Texas.  It is at that stage where any of those final material decisions you've been putting off due to indecision have come to a head and are likely about to affect your bottom line.  I've been there.  In fact, I'm there right now.  On Tuesday I have to  make the final decision on just the same thing for my own design project in Irving, Texas.  I'm still wavering. 

The point of this quick little exercise was to help determine the color of the metal roof.  I was given the black and white rendering above and asked to render it in color in order to make a decision on the roof color.  If you don't know, metal roofs come in a large variety of colors and I don't envy the decision maker. As I said, I have to make the same decision myself in just over 48 hours.  Tick. Tock.

Long story short, I created several renderings in Photoshop with different roof colors.  The one above illustrates the Berridge 'Champagne' roof color.  Hopefully, all is well and I did my job.  A decision will be made.

On the other hand, and the reason for the post, is to ponder the progression I've made with my own rendering capabilities despite having concentrated on production and project management for the last 10 years.  Bare with me.

As an architecture student of the late '90s, rendering quickly went from hand drawing (at which I kicked ass) to  computer generated renderings (uh, not so much).  I took up using 3D Studio Max; I even took a class.  This is a very laborious program and not for the light of heart.  When I had to retire my desktop my parents got me in school, the program was never spoken of again.  And there were no hard feelings.

In the mean time, I taught myself Photoshop.  In fact, months before I graduated from KU, I purchased the student version of the software and installed it on every computer I've owned until just a few years ago.  Microsoft seems to have an issue with providing drivers for super old software (Note to self:  Buy a Mac).  When I finally got an updated version installed on my work computer, it blew me away.  Sadly, my skills were a paltry match to this new version of Photoshop and I was lost. 

Recently, I took more care to learn Adobe Illustrator; I even signed up for several classes.  Plus, and I can't stress this enough, Google Images is so much more useful than it was back in the day!  Do you realize it launched  in July of 2001?  Where would we be now without it?

Any way, I brought a whole new bag of tricks to the table for this project and I couldn't be happier for the experience.  I've worked with so many talented designers in the past that would make mincemeat of my image below.  But, I'm still learning.  And moving in a forward trajectory. 

Below is a result of my continued work on the same rendering in an effort to learn all the "cool-kid-tricks". It's a process.  A process that after 20 year in the business, I'm still excited to explore.

Now, can someone please direct me to a You Tube video that will help me better understand filters?