Riding in the Desert

Riding in the desert and riding in the desert antiqued is a "simple" digital collage of two images one of a rodeo scene and another of mountains with water in front.  Most people seem to prefer the simplicity of the sepia version and perhaps they don't like the fantasy element of the blue mountains in the first version.  After combining the two I had to fill in the gaps with fake desert soil and then worked on the effects to add the canvas texture and quite a lot of burn and dodge on the horse and on the first row of mountains.  I decided against adding desert plants because it would take me many hours more to add them.
Some might not like the intensity of color in the original which i could have reduced by partially applying sepia over the color, but the horse was a very strong red-brown in the reference photo and I just didn't feel right in changing him to a boring common brown.

Riding in the Desert

Riding in the Desert Antiqued