Runway of the Understudies | LMAC FreeStyle No. 5

Since deciding to continue the freestyle collages in the LMAC Community, I've created four so far. My current collage project is the fifth in my FreeStyle collage theme series. I also decided to concentrate on one collage theme for each post.

For my Freestyle Collage No. 5, the theme was "understudies". Some may call them replacements, or substitutes for the real person. A qualified duplicate perhaps that can step in on short notice and perform almost as well as the original. With a creative background stage, the understudies who stepped in for the regular models performed well at the gala event. They were asked to return by popular demand.

Here is the final result. I'll explain my steps below in exploring the theme of understudies.

To create my collage theme, in addition to my fractal art, I had an idea to create variations of a few of the LIL images. The reason was that I've used several members' images numerous times. I felt it would be great to have different variations of the same image.

For example, I utilize about four or five LMAC members' images that fit my collage theme styles. @eve66 and @mballesteros are weekly additions to my themes.

Since discovering free open-sourced stable diffusion programs, I've been able to take a few images I use frequently from the LIL and revamp them with simple text prompts. Using the LIL images as the starting point, the program was able to produce lovely versions in the style I indicates.

Take a look at these images from the LIL:

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I still need to touch up the sitting angel. However, I feel she turned out nicely. I couldn't figure out why the program inserted a white background. I know the images are transparent. Perhaps @eve can instruct me on how to correct my version and make it a transparent image also.

I love variety, so I feel that the stable diffusion images will work to provide an alternative and give me a different feel to my themes without using the same LIL images each week. Just as I use Deep Dream Generator to add filtering to all the images I use in my collage themes.

After completion of the stable diffusion art, I then paired it with a few images in the LIL, together with my fractal art. My fractal piece turned out nicely in the scene as part of the background stage prop. It actually looks as though the models are on the leaves of the flower.

Since this is a Freestyle, this week I didn't utilize the current or any previous contest photo in my theme.

I uploaded all images into Canva to take advantage of my Annual Pro Membership Subscription. Below are the additional images I included to complete my theme.

• Green Web created by me in Apophysis 2.09

• Lush landscape with mountains created by me in Nvidia Gaugan2

• White flower Contributed to the #LIL by @tejimundo

• Dolphin Contributed to the #LIL by @poderart

• Water droplets by Open-ClipArt Vectors at Pixabay