Sunrise was created from one of my original photographs that I have painted into on the computer.  The process is more complicated than I can explain here but basically, I am pulling the pixels of color around with a coarse brush tool to create the brush strokes.  Once I finish painting the piece I create a duplicate layer that is desaturated, embossed and merged with the color layer to highlight the brush strokes that have been created.  I prefer the control of creating my own brush strokes to achieve these oil painting effects because I feel the weight, direction and style of the brush strokes all play important roles in the final work of art.