Used two strobe flashes leaving the shutter open for 1.6 sec. Camera carefully suspended from the garage door opener. I was on resting on three paint cans to lift my body off the ground (1 head, 1 back, 1 butt). The light marks on the arms and legs are caused by the reflection of light off the background. My arms weren't white enough to subdue them like I'd hoped. :( This shot took 3 days of setup and shooting and two days of post processing. I'm soooo sleepy.
raw tools
all arms and legs were layer mapped to isolate them
used curves to make arms and legs seem more solid
merged arms and legs into one layer
added torso to layer map, isolating the body in the foreground
auto white balance on background layer
tone mapped the x2 the body (foreground)
color balance foreground increasing red and yellow
tone mapped background x2
unsharp mask foreground
gaussian blur background
merged visible layers
burning tool on pelvic lines
burning tool on leaf
rotate
crop
incresed canvas size to create black border
used healing tool on moles
dodge tool on neck crease
levels
used three blurred layers with layer masks to smooth skin
scale to 720px
blurred and dodged neck, right arms, and left leg to minimize white pattern
[Sep. 27th, 2009 04:47:57 PM]
.....
It is not a fig leaf. I'm not sure what kind of plant it came from. Something around the house.
[Sep. 28th, 2009 11:43:00 AM]
I just got an email from DPC, that my photo has been validated. Even though I never submit thinking I'm breaking any rules, I always pucker a little wondering if I'm going to be one of those people who broke them without realizing it. :)
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Place: 31 out of 53 Avg (all users): 5.4260 Avg (commenters): 7.5556 Avg (participants): 5.3784 Avg (non-participants): 5.4303 Views since voting: 10603 Views during voting: 1540 Votes: 446 Comments: 9 Favorites: 0
Clever and very well executed. My first impression was that this might have been topped if the right foot had been kept straight, but then I looked at Da Vinci's original and it wasn't straight either, except it was the left foot there ;) /9
Basics are there but several details are wrong such as the feet are mirror images and the hands are not outstretched. I suppose the fig leaf is to meet dpreview sensitivities, so no deduction. The reposed look of his head vs. the head on look of the original takes away from it, IMHO. Liked the lighting and background.
this photo grows on me more and more every time i look at it. i gave it an 8 last night, but that may change sometime in the next few days. is he just laying on one of those muslin backgrounds? very cool effect you've created.
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