Wall Calendar Old Steam Engines

When functional elements of civilisation grow antiquated, they can become sculptures for future generations, newly appreciated for their old-time charm. After spending hours searching the Library of Congress digital library for images of these relics, I selected twelve high-quality, black-and-white photographs to use as subjects for this wall calendar. For each original, black-and-white photograph, I made what amounts to a digital painting. Using the photograph as a base, I first adjusted light and dark tones to make the highest contrast image on which to build colours. I then layered colours using multiple sheets on top of one another, which I selectively adjusted, erased parts of or used only selected parts of a layer. When everything looked right, I merged all layers, further adjusted colour balance, tweaked contrast, and added some texture or graininess. The final images are romanticised and surreal.