Project 2B Replacement - Photo Manipulation

16.09.2023 / Retake Week
Vanessa Kei Kurniadi (0360525)
Bachelor of Design in Creative Media
Project 2B: Photo Manipulation

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PROJECT 2: PHOTO MANIPULATION

INSTRUCTION

*Only Apply for Project 2 - Photo Manipulation

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In this project, I was instructed to make a photo manipulation by combining 2 objects with similar shapes and characters to make a shape that looks like neither one of them.

Examples:

fig 1.1 examples of photo manipulation

When I first explored the concept, I indulged too far in the definition of photo manipulation. I saw so much advanced editing and I lost the important point: it's not about making a whole new fantasy world with your skill in editing, it's about combining 2 objects into 1 unreal object with Photoshop.

My initial concept was to make a world inside a book, where there is a hole on the page and from the hole you can see a face of a person seeing the world inside. The second one was making a unicorn out of a horse and a horn inside a pretty cave.

fig 1.2 Initial (and scratched) ideas of the concept

Mr Martin told me that I did it wrong. That was when it hit me that I had gone too far when the wanted concept was actually far simpler. So I made another sketch using whatever I had in mind while searching for objects in my surroundings and scrolling through Pinterest. 

fig 1.3 Second attempt sketches

I made 6 concepts:

• 1: Flower out of candle fire, but then changed to mushroom as an umbrella
• 2: Hamster as computer mouse
• 3: Kitten loaf as a shoe
• 4: Clothes hung as traffic light
• 5: Potato as seal
• 6: Onion ring as ring

Then Sir Martin told me that 1 of the objects must be from me, and I should take a photo of it myself. The second picture can be taken from the internet. From my belongings, I could only do 2, 3, and 4. After some thinking, I just decided to go with idea 2.

I started by collecting the pictures I needed. For the images, I took a photo of my mouse and took a picture of a tiny white hamster from Pinterest.

fig 1.4 Preparing the original images, Hamster and computer mouse

I put the images in Photoshop and started by trying to make the hamster black. But I didn't know how I could make it so I looked for another image. After scrolling through, I then chose a picture of a rat.

fig 1.5 Rat photo from Freepik

This dark brown rat is far easier to match my black mouse, so I proceeded with this image instead.

fig 1.6 First 4 steps of the photoshop

First I started by putting the rat on my canvas and used a masking tool to hide the tail. I then put the mouse on top of the rat to adjust the position. I also gave the mouse a solid color, put it into clipping mask to put it on top of the mouse, and use the screen blending mode to make the mouse a brownish color. Then I duplicated the rat moved it to the top and prepare for turning the mouse into a furry one.

I always try to refrain from deleting anything by using the masking tool to not destroy the original. So if I ever need to bring something back, I can do it easily. I also tend to duplicate my work before doing the next major step, in case something goes wrong and I need to redo it.

fig 1.7 warped rat

Next I want to cover up the entire mouse with the rat fur, so I used the warp tool in transform feature to make the mouse "fatter" and then proceed with the masking.

I then started to trim the edges of the rat by using the masking tool, and also reveal the buttons and the cable source.

fig 1.8 masked rat with mouse

For the last touch, to make it more fancy, I put the razor logo on the rat's head, just like the bottom of my mouse. I also added some shadow to make it more realistic. I made the shadow by copying the outline of the rat-mouse, filling it with a brown color, and use gaussian blur so the shadow is not too sharp.

fig 1.9 adding the finishing touch to the rat-mouse

Final Look

fig 1.10 Rat - Mouse Final Look

fig 1.11 Rat-Mouse Final Look PDF

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Reflection

Experience

This project has been quite fun. I had a great time exploring what tools are best for some work, and what I could do to manipulate the objects as I desire. I thought changing the colour of the hamster to black was easy, but after trying out a few methods which didn't work, I found out I'm not capable of that yet, but thankfully I got another alternative.

Observation

From my observation, I realized my peer's work is not too simple but also not too complicated. I want to keep my work simple so as to not make myself suffer but I also don't want it to be too simple. I also saw that there are a lot of forms of photo manipulation, from simple manipulation to a whole different magical world.

Findings

I found a lot of new and fun methods to work on my project this time. I also found out that lighting is really important. When you've decided to work with a light source, you have to make sure the rest of the work follows along with the source. I also easily made the direction of the shadow thanks to the obvious light source.