Thank-You! I ended up scribbling in black the outline of the trees I wanted, in different sizes. Then I used the frosted glass effect on setting 2. Then I used oil painting on smallest brush size and maximum coarseness (actually had to repeat the oil painting twice or three times I think). The trees were on a separate layer than the background and the 'ground' they sit on. If I had seen Jezulkim's thread on starfields I would have used that! But maybe next time eh?
Is it worthy of a tut you think?