Frequency Separation

Frequency Separation of an image creates two layers: one containing the texture information (high frequency) and one containing the colour information (low frequency).  It is a technique usually employed to enhance portraits.

I decided to experiment and misuse it to create an abstract.

Having created the separation, I reduced the colour layer to just 12 pixels by 9 pixels.  I then enlarged it again to the full size of the original image without any interpolation. I then offset alternate rows by half a block, wrapping the overspill back to the start of that row.

It was then just a matter of recombining it with the texture layer.

The experiment was inspired by Ingeborg's Abstract Thursday theme of colour blocking.

The original image (extra) was of weatherd/peeling paint on a bollard beside Kirkcaldy Harbour.

My conclusion is that it hasn't really worked in this instance but maybe it is a technique worth trying again sometime on a different image.  I think that by retaining the pixelated colour layer, it has created its own tecture to compete with the texture layer.  Maybe I should have allowed interpolation when enlarging the pixels?  No time to try it now though.