The digital competition assigned topic at last night’s camera club meeting was ‘Creative Images (Enhanced/Manipulated)’ with the definition being: Use your creativity and think out of the box for this one. Show off your talents using software to create effects that make your photos something more than just a photo. You may combine several images into one but all the components must be your own photographic work.
Since this is not the type of thing I normally do I had to work at coming up with a concept from photos in my collection. I looked at some images on the web for inspiration. Then I looked through several of my images asking myself the questions: ‘What could I do to this to make it more creative? What could I add or combine this with?’ I pulled a few images and began to play with them and after a few tries I came up with the concept below. I shot the trunk last summer in the shed at an old abandoned house. ‘What could be coming out of that trunk? … some eyes? … a scary clown?’. The eye of a toad close-up, which I also use as my avatar here and elsewhere quickly came to mind. I isolated the eye, copied it and flipped it making two eyes which I then blended and feathered. I made a path around the opening of the trunk so the eyes could fit nicely inside, deleting the portion outside the box I then blended the form into the darkness of the opening. My last step was to create a cast shadow from the edges of the box onto the form. The image received a nice reaction from the crowd (including surprise and chuckles) and I was happy to be awarded second place for my latest creative endeavor!
