Lily Stars and Mandala

I created a foliage star with the leaves of the lily plants. I desaturated it, and colorized it blue and purple and darkened both versions to use as alternate radial backgrounds for the lily mandala. I stroked the stars with 9 pixels of white to make it pop out from the background. With the flower star. I duplicated a layer and turned it solid white, and rotated it to serve in the outer ring. I felt that the star needed some more bright white. This is a new technique I will use again. I am showing you the stars and then the mandalas with the darkened stars as radial backgrounds. I could do the same with the flower star or any other star I make. With this, I now have all the elements needed to complete the mandala and array.

Lily Backgrounds

I have started using photos of Easter Lily Flowers to create a mandala and other designs. I have used photos of leaves to create a patterned background as you see first. It is nice, but not as interesting as I wanted; so I cut out a lily plant and superimposed the resulting pattern as seen in the second image. That was more complex, but didn't look right; so I reduced the opacity of that layer to 55% and got the third image. I then darkened the whole design to serve better as a background. This is a technique I will use more of as it adds a whole new dimension to the designs.