Using Textures In My Pictures

Now that you've seen some of my photography using textures, I thought it was time to talk about textures in general. There are a slew of tutorials and you tube videos on the process of applying textures to photographs. Everyone has their own techniques. I'm no different. But what there isn't a lot of information on are the artistic considerations of choosing one texture over another. I look at other people's work and think wow how did they make that texture work into a photograph like that? So lately I've been actually thinking about my process of choice. Usually its an entirely visceral experience of what makes my eyes happy. But actually thinking about my texture choices has lead me to some artistic conclusions I make before, during, and after the texture[s] are applied. So in no real order of importance, here they are.

1. Overall what do I want this photograph to look like? Vintage, colorful, or what?
2. What is the color scheme of the photograph, the lighting SOOC?
3. Once I have a general idea of the answers to those questions, I next ponder my collection of textures. I wish I could say my texture collection is organized and orderly, but its not.
4. So at this point I'm now looking for the general color and feel of the textures.
5. This step is important..do a google search for "fine art textures" and check out some of the amazing artists online. A lot of them offer freebies. And all of them have reasonable prices for some really outstanding textures.Check out the links under "Sites Of Interest" for some of my favorite texture artists. I've also found some beautiful free textures on flickr. If you want specific recommendations, drop me a line and I'll tell you some of my favorites. 
6. The next step is to drop in on Totally Rad! http://www.gettotallyrad.com/ and check out a product they have called "Dirty Pictures." I use it and love it. It streamlines the texture application process and makes it easy breezy to try on various textures with various blending modes before you make your final texture decision. A+ product and I don't mind saying so.
7. Now I wish I could say I have found a true blue method of fitting a texture to a photograph. But honestly its just a trial and error performance. However the article below describes in excellent detail some of the artistic decisions in considering what textures to use for a photograph and why.

Related articles

• Tips for Texturing Photographs (digital-photography-school.com)

I hope this helps a little in understanding the decision making process for texture application.