Photobashing and Separating Values

 Photobashing -

For this task I decided I would try out photobashing two images together, I tried to search my camera roll for images that have a similar perspective and that i could potentially blend together into a new image. I decided to choose these two images as they both have a similar perspective and very clear vertical planes that i could line up to one another. I cropped out only the most important aspects of each image that i wanted to display, that being the fireplace and sofa in the living room image and the right hand side of the apartment image. I also flipped the living room image so that it would frame the scene a little better. Then i used levels to adjust the picture of the living room to better match the values in the apartment image, this is done so that the images blend together much easier and look more seamless. Then  converted both images to grayscale, it is easier to work in grayscale when working with values as opposed to working in colour, in grayscale the direction of the tones can either be more white or more black, meanwhile by using hues there are more factors to count in such as the amount of red, blue and yellow that make up that colour. i adjusted the hues and added in atmospheric fog to not only push the lighting to be more cinematic but also to bring objects closer or further away from the camera. Cinematic lighting is using light and shadow to either frame a scene, build a sense of setting or set the mood. It can be created by choosing your primary light source, where the most light will be seen in a composition [this can be compared to the lightbox on filming sets] and secondary or environmental lighting, that helps push the mood or define a setting. Environmental lighting can be reflections, highlights or even smaller light sources such as candles. This exercise was quite difficult to get the hang of but i think this could be really helpful when thumbnailing or developing environmental settings. The only thing to bare in mind is continuity of perspective, If one image is slightly off perspective you can use the warp and transform tools to pull the image to cooperate with the perspective much better.

Image 1 : Photo of an apartment media room

Image 2 : Living room

Separating Values -

When creating depth in a scene it is important to keep your values in mind, in enclosed spaces the further something is away from you, the darker it will be. We can use this to split our canvas into 3 planes, the background, midground and foreground. The darkest shades will be in the background, the middle shades will be in the midground, and the lightest shades will be in the foreground if we are drawing something like a room. To draw something outside with a lot of distance, we reverse this, having the darkest tones closest to the camera and the lightest tones in the distance. This effect is called atmospheric perspective and when used outdoors it infers the illusion of distance and the existence of air. A final thing to note is when choosing your 3 tones make sure that when you split those tones up into light and dark, your lightest middle tone is not lighter than the lightest light tone. By making your values too close together you can break the illusion of depth and make your scene harder to read. However if you do find yourself in this state you can always use atmospheric fog to better define subjects in a scene.