Cloning & Overlays

In the "before" image the subject of my creation is the sun, looked at through a random car part of my brothers that I found. This was taken out in the woods as the sun was shining through the trees. This photo was taken with my phone camera through the car part that I held up, focusing the lens on the lines that go through it. In the "after" image it was the same car part, but instead I changed the background to a photo I took of Popham beach. To do this I used photoshop: I began by bringing in the original image, then copying/pasting the beach image on top of it. Once I had centered it where I wanted it to go, I brought down the opacity so that the original image was slightly visible. Then I used the eraser tool to erase areas of the beach photo that were outside the outline of the gear. Finally, the opacity was put back to 100% to complete the editing of the image. I chose to edit this artwork because I found this photo interesting and since I have plenty of images with sunsets in the background, I thought this would be the perfect opportunity for me to edit my photo. The specific elements and principles of design that I used in this photo are line, color, balance, and pattern. This photo is very balanced and central.

The composition rules and techniques that I used in this photo are formal balance since the subject is central in the image, selective focus on the end of the car part, leading lines because the lines in the car part lead your eyes to the sun, and framing since I framed the sun inside the part. My project evolved because when I finished all of the erasing and fitting of the two images together, something looked off. I then realized that the point of focus was being interrupted, so I blurred the new sunset a bit to make the image return to a proper focus.

The story behind this image is that there will always be a light at the end of the tunnel, so you just have to power through whatever is happening (not actually, lol). This relates to my life because I chose how to compose the image and took it on my own. I think my image could be stronger if I had used a smaller sized eraser tool when going around the silhouette of the gear because the new image doesn't follow the shape of the gear perfectly, making it look a little rounded. Also, I think I could have made the natural light in the gear have a more yellow hue to make it match the lighting coming from the photo of the beach.