Photography with Jeff Bentz From Pixels to Paint: Turning Your Photos into a Different Kind of Art with Photoshop and AI by Jeff Bentz
Photography has always been more than just capturing what’ s in front of the lens. It’ s about expressing how something feels and showing the emotion of a scene. The softness of morning fog, the gentle movement of waves flowing across the sand, or the mix of light and shadow can make a scene come alive. Today, in the digital world there are powerful tools like Adobe Photoshop, creative plugins, and AI programs such as Midjourney and Adobe Firefly, that allow photographers to have more ways than ever to turn their images into creative works of art.
The journey from camera to output medium begins with a click of the shutter and a spark of imagination. Maybe it’ s a photo of the foggy redwoods at Mount Madonna Park or a sunset behind the lighthouse in Santa Cruz, which are beautiful on their own, but with a little creativity and imagination could elevate it from a snapshot to a statement. One of the most powerful tools, Photoshop, is where that transformation begins. With its ample set of brushes and filters photographers and digital artists can shape and mold their images in the same way a painter layers color and texture.
Photoshop offers advanced artistic filters that enable users to transform photographs into images resembling watercolors, oil paintings, or pastel drawings, effectively simulating traditional art media. In these filters there is a lot of control, you can keep the fine detail of a photograph while softening the mood or texture to create a painterly impression.
What matters most is the vision behind the image— the feeling you want to convey and the tools you choose to express it.— Jeff Bentz
it. You can use AI to explore new styles or reinterpret your own images through a fresh artistic lens. Adobe Firefly, for example, allows you to upload a photo and guide the AI to render it as a watercolor or oil painting, maintaining your composition while reimagining its texture and tone. Midjourney excels at the imaginative by creating dreamlike scenes that feel painted by the mind’ s eye. Many digital artists are beginning to blend these AI-generated visuals with their own photographs in Photoshop, combining the precision of real-world capture with the freedom of AI-driven artistry.
In this AI era, the boundaries between photography, painting, and digital art are becoming less defined. What matters most is the vision behind the image— the feeling you want to convey and the tools you choose to express it. Whether you’ re adding a painterly wash to a local landscape, or collaborating with AI to imagine the impossible, endless possibilities are now available.
Photography has always been about capturing light. But now, with Photoshop and AI, we can sculpt that light, paint it, and even dream with it. The camera gives us the story, but these tools allow us to express it in entirely new ways. Most photographers edit to bring out color and detail, and the image is still very true to how the scene looked. On the other hand, you can also use your photos as a basis to create a digital art masterpiece. So, the next time you open one of your photos, don’ t just ask how you can edit it— ask what it could become.
For those who want to go even further, third-party plugins expand Photoshop’ s creative boundaries. Programs such as Topaz Studio and Luminar Neo provide presets that mimic the look and feel of handmade art. They let you adjust paper grain, brush size, and color, allowing your digital images to take on the character of real-world materials. A landscape photo can become a watercolor with soft washes of color or the luminous qualities of a pastel drawing. These tools can help add a handcrafted artistic quality to digital images.
While Photoshop remains the go-to tool for editing photos, the rise of artificial intelligence( AI) has added a new dimension to visual art. Midjourney and Adobe Firefly can now generate images from text prompts. Type in a phrase like“ a watercolor of a mountainside at sunset” or“ an impressionist painting of a misty redwood forest,” and within seconds, AI will produce a series of artistic interpretations that might surprise and inspire you.
For some photographers and artists, these tools are not replacements for the creative process— they are extensions of
The top photo on the opposite page is of a courtyard in Old Town Marbella in Spain. I used Topaz Studio to give it a watercolor effect. I then uploaded it to Firefly and entered the text command“ Add a T-Rex to the courtyard and show some destruction”.
If you’ re interested in Photoshop there are some good classes at Gavilan College.
Jeff Bentz is a travel and landscape photographer in Gilroy, CA. Follow him on Instagram: @ jeff _ bentz _ photography View his portfolio: jeffbentzphotography. com
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