Starting Early on New Year's Resolutions

I'm starting one of my business New Year's Resolutions early.  I'm trying to improve my photo backgrounds on photos that I post for my Studio Marcy Etsy shop.

I've gone through the phase of the colored backgrounds, and the gray backgrounds and now I'm on the "white" backgrounds.  My artistic concession is to sometimes keep a bit of the shadow, while I white out the rest of it.  You can see my mermaid beaded ink pens  with two whiter backgrounds and one original.  Quite a difference, isn't it?

Of course it would help if my original photos were better and I will work on those too.  But for right now, Photoshop Elements 4.0 and its Magic Wand Tool  is my new BF.

If you've got a Photoshop trick for improving photos, please feel free to post it in the comments section.  I think we can always use some helpful hints and new ways to do things.

Thor the Viking on Squidoo

Have you seen Thor yet? He's a lampwork glass bead Viking who has been turned into a retractable ballpoint pen on a wood base. Somewhere he read that the pen is mightier than the sword and he's exploring that possibility.

Thor has taken time out from his busy days of pillaging and plundering, because he is one of the featured artisan products in "Uber Cool Handmade or Decorated Pens" on Squidoo.
http://www.squidoo.com/awesome-handmade-pens

It's worth taking the time off. He is trying to become more of a chick magnet and if he's working all the time, it's very hard to meet them. The old Viking ways aren't too PC right now.

Stop by and visit him along with other items in my shop. If you aren't familiar with Squidoo and their lenses, spend a little time there too. There are all kinds of interesting topics and you can learn a lot by reading them. Maybe make one yourself too? Lori, who is wordvixen on Etsy wrote this one. Thank you Lori!

Thor is also available in my etsy shop, http://www.StudioMarcy.etsy.com along with other artisan lampwork glass pens which make great presents for collectors and people with a great sense of fun. Please don't forget, I love custom orders!
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