Additional Notes

— About my art —

In the image to the left, on top is a copy of the master template, that I used to make both the Red Butterfly, and the Blue Butterfly. The butterfly template was made back on September 23, 1999.

Below the butterfly template, is the original finished version of the Blue Butterfly. Although, the versions that I posted online, back in about July of 2000, were adjusted to look better on a black background. Those versions of the Blue Butterfly were given an aura, or green flames, or set on a background image.

To the right is a lightly revised version of the original Blue Butterfly. I focused mostly on just darkening the dark regions, to make the colored areas stand out more. Back 1999, and in the early 2000s, most of us were using CRT (Cathode Ray Tube) monitors. On those old CRT monitors, the dark areas on the early versions of the Blue (and Red) Butterflies appeared to be darker than they do on modern screens. To fix this, I needed to give the Blue Butterfly a hue and luminosity adjustment to the darker areas, to make those areas appear dark again.

The Frozen Butterfly, to the left, is placed on one of my texture art backgrounds. Actually, the butterfly is on a background image that is placed on another background image. This is a December 23, 2015 revised version of The Frozen Butterfly, with the body and wings of the latest Blue Butterfly pasted over the December 27, 2000 version, leaving only the original antennas from that first Blue Butterfly.

In making the first version of The Frozen Butterfly, back on July 03, 2000, I had first placed a copy of the original Blue Butterfly on a light blue background, but I did not save the process that I used to get to the final frozen look stage, like I usually do, so I cannot tell you, with certainty, the steps I took to make the frozen part.

I can say that on July 06, 2000, I pasted that frozen butterfly image onto the background texture art, titled Blue Moon, that I had created on that day, and then cropped out a section to make the first Frozen Butterfly art piece. I had finally figured out how to make the Frozen Butterfly presentable enough to post online. Before then, that frozen butterfly image was just a curiosity to me. I knew I would find a use for it, but I was not sure how or when. It only took three days to figure something out.

In this new version of The Frozen Butterfly, I had to search out, and find, that original background texture art, so I could crop out a larger section than I did with the first version. I had forgotten where in my art archives I had gotten that texture art from. I had even looked in the Blue Moon project folders a few times, not seeing it for what it was an embarrassing number of times. A thumbnail view was not enough, I had to open the right image file, at full-size, to find the right set of images. The source image that I used for the Frozen Butterfly was not the first image I opened, in the Blue moon project folder, but I knew that I was, finally, in the right place when I saw the Blue Moon at full size. It turned out that the source image for the Frozen Butterfly background texture was image 6 of the Blue Moon project. Image 6 is just an experimental-side-step, not one of the actual Blue Moon images, but the Blue Moon is merged into image 6. Now, I have finally rediscovered that the Blue Butterfly was frozen onto a Blue Moon.

Here, to the right, we have the December 23, 2015 Blue Butterfly with the newly revised antennas. I call this the B-version of the Blue Butterfly because I made the other new A-version antennas first.

It was not just the antennas that were revised in this new version of the Blue Butterfly though. The entire body section was reworked. I also smoothed out the vein structure a little more, although more work could be done to make them look even better. Perhaps in the next new version, I will finally get to that.

Here, to the left, we have the A-version of the new Blue Butterfly made into a button.

By the way, these buttons are free for personal use. Most of my art, with a copyright stamp, is free to use on personal pages.

And finally, to the right, we have the B-version of the new Blue Butterfly button.

If you do want to use any of my copyright stamped art, please read the terms of use page for more details, or contact me personally.

Michael A. Crane, Jr.
Artist/Webmaster/Writer