Abstract: I created a six picture portfolio with an emphasis on composition and color correction.
On Brutal Geoff, the first picture, I made a composition of myself and on of my favorite video game characters, Eddie Riggs from "Brutal Legend." I used the quick select on my face in the original picture of myself and then made and inverse selection and a layer mask in order to remove everything but my face. I then did the same exact thing with Eddie's face in the original picture of him. I moved and transformed my own face with the warp and scale transformation until I thought it fit the picture best. I then worked on color correction. I adjusted the curves on both pictures until I had darker and more defined colors. However, my face still seemed too pale and so I burned it until I felt it fit the color scheme better. Finally, I made circles with the clone stamp to give the illusion of feedback from the guitar in my hands.
On the second picture, I composed a picture of myself and my room mate with some pictures of "Sesame Street" characters. The original picture of myself and my room mate had us in a dorm room wearing shirts with Oscar and Elmo's faces on them and standing next to each other looking odd. I decided to take this and make the most messed up looking image of "Sesame Street" I could possibly come up with. I used the quick select and move tools to move our heads putting my face on my room mate's body and vice versa. I then warped and changed the scale of both heads until they blended in with the shirts. I removed the dorm room in the background with the magic wand and quick select tools. I brought in pictures of Oscar and Elmo on the internet, transformed their scale, and then placed them on their respective bodies. I added a dash of color that resembles each head to make a more believable neck for each head. I moved the bodies of myself and my room mate to opposite sides of the screen; and finally I placed a warped picture of "Sesame Street" behind myself and my room mate as the background.
The third picture is a composition of two video games made by the same company but each game is set in a different time period. Clearly I placed the old west character on top of the modern day background. I had a lot of trouble warping and re-scaling the old west character, John, so that he would block out the modern day character. I did not know how to properly use layer masks at this time and had to make the best of what I knew how to do. So any part of the modern day character I could not cover, I clone stamped a different piece of the picture on top of to retain a natural look. I then burned John and color corrected the background, in which I think the change in the sky came out quite nicely.
The fourth picture is simply my hour long drawing from the beginning of class. I added to it a picture of the tri-force in the background that I found on the internet. I then made some color correction changes to the tri-force picture and that about sums it up.
The fifth picture was a tad tricky as I took it from Facebook. Being that I took it from Facebook it came into photoshop a bit small and blurry. I dodged it, burned it, and adjusted the curves to make darker and more vibrant shades of each color. The original picture is very gray and bleak I think I did a good job of changing that. Finally I added an opaque picture of a chimp for comedic effect. I made a layer mask on the picture of the chimp to take out the background on that picture and then pasted what was left on top of the picture of me and my friends. I then sponged the chimp the change its opacity.
The sixth and final picture, is a color correction. I adjusted the curves on the picture and then burned the lower part of the background to make shadows and dodged the top piece to make it seem as the sun is hitting it harder.
Self Evaluation:
It is my opinion that I have come a rather far way since I began working with photoshop. If I had a chance to do something differently I think it would be increase my precision with the selection tools and to practice with examples more often in order to learn the best ways in which to use the tools available to me. For example, once I got the handle of quick masks, making composition using non-destructive work flow became much easier than my old ritual of tedious cut and paste work.
