As soon as I saw the challenge, I knew what I wanted to shoot. I have always wanted to shoot a scary Michael Myers like scene from Halloween. The thing I worried about was the lighting and the correct location for the shot. My utility stairs to the basement seemed like the perfect place to shoot. I had to do this during the day so I took advantage of the brightness behind me and used some side lighting for additional mood.
I shot this on Halloween and this oufit and mask really got me in the mood to scare someone for real. So, while my wife and kids were out trick-o-treating with our friends (brownsm's family), I was able to go out and scare the snot out of my wife and a couple other neighbors (i made sure to refrain from scaring the kids and went straight for the adults!). Great fun!
Shot in RAW, adjusted curves, exposure in CS2 RAW converted. Opened in Elements 3.0. Cropped and rotated to give unbalanced feel. Adjusted levels, hue/saturation (dropped reds/yellows/ greens). Noise Ninja for increased contrast, USM and smoothness of face and background. Cloned out ceiling light and cabinets in background. Added hue/saturation layer to desaturate blues - masked out suit. Added levels adjustment layer and darkened - masked out figure to lighten him relative to background. Save for web. USM at small radius. Save.
I think this will do well - probably at least a 6.5.
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Place: 8 out of 83 Avg (all users): 6.6816 Avg (commenters): 7.8462 Avg (participants): 6.2174 Avg (non-participants): 6.8023 Views since voting: 4455 Views during voting: 415 Votes: 223 Comments: 21 Favorites: 0
Peter, I love what you've done to your hair! Congrats once again. You are on a roll. Pretty high commenter average, too. Well done!
edit to add: Peter mentions scaring some of the adults too during the trick-or-treating fun. peter snuck up behind one grown man, then put his hand on this guy's shoulders. He shrieked like a 5-yr old girl!
Well many congrats on the high finish and replacing you 'fun' halloween shot on your profile with much darker one
I love the overexposed background behind michael myers, from your notes this had been the bit that had concerned you before the shoot but I have to say you nailed it 100%
It made me laugh that you scared the snot out of your wife, but I have to confess that if you had jumped out at me like that I would have been less than happy
Great homage to a film that scared the beejesus out of me when I first saw it
Great composition, fabulous really, my only gripe is the mask, it's not fitting the model correctly, it's loose and looks un-authentic. The model is tall enough. And thats not the original Captain Kirk mask! 6
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