Destroyed portrait - Photoshop Processes
Once I took my pictures, I chose which one should be my background with just my sister under an apple tree. By double clicking on the image in bridge, the setting automatically opened the image in Photoshop. Before I opened another image, I changed the lighting by clicking on Image-Adjustments - Levels. By doing this, I was able to change the brightness and darkness.
I needed to then choose a picture for the left arm to make the skin into egg shells by using the Polygon Lasso tool to select the arm. I went to Select - Save Selection and then named the selection and the layer ‘Left Arm’. By saving the selection, the outline isn't forgotten.
I clicked on the egg file and dragged the image to the other file tag. By duplicating the new egg layer I could then use it again in the future. I clicked on Select - Load Selection which brought up my selected arm from earlier. I inverted the selection and I went on Select - Modify - Feather to one pixel. This made the edges of the arm soft and more realistic.
After deleting the inverted selection, an arm shape made of egg shells appeared. Although the arm looked good it still didn't look realistic enough. Therefore, I changed the level for that layer only. This made it look a little bit more real. Also, I played around with the opacity and chose 62%.
Because the suns position made shadows on top of the left arm, I used the Dodge & Burn tool to make a slight shadow. I selected Highlights and changed the exposure to 60% and then 42%. The subject was wearing a black hairband on her left arm and because of the egg shell skin on top, I had to erase the egg shells layer so the hairband looks darker.
Because I wanted all of the subjects skin to look like egg shells, I did exactly the same approach to the right arm and the face. However, I had to remember the egg shell image needed to match the lighting on the original image.
Once I finished the skin, I started changing the apples on the tree to boiled eggs. Firstly, I dragged one of my egg images into Photoshop, I then clicked on the Polygon Lasso tool to cut out the egg. By going on Select - Save Selection, I used this boiled egg picture again for another tree egg. I named the existing layer 'Apple Egg'.
Inverting the image deselected the egg but selected the rest of the image. To get rid of those parts, I simply deleted it and the egg was the only part left. I then picked which apple the egg was going to replace, rotate and re-size so it was just big enough to hide the apple. Unfortunately, I realized that I needed to flip the image because I took the photo of the egg with the sunlight facing the shadowed area of the apple. Therefore, I clicked on Edit - Transform - Flip Horizontal and this automatically flipped the egg.
After re-positioning the egg on to the apple, I duplicated that layer so I could use the egg again on another apple. Because the two eggs looked the same, I inversed it back to the original image. This made the eggs more realistic with the lighting. I did this with different images of eggs that I took and use the same image two or three times. Once I hid all of the apples with eggs, I went over each of them with the Dodge & Burn tool, shading the eggs to look better on the background image.
To add to the surrealism of the image, I wanted to make the subject look like an egg. Therefore, I took images of eggs with hard and runny yolk. I didn't know which image would be better so I chose both to see them on the background image first to help me get a more accurate view of what the images would look like. After clicking 'Place' on both images in Photoshop,I changed the layer names to 'Immy 1' and 'Immy 2'. To make the egg part of the subject, I needed to use the Polygon Lasso tool to select the eggs. I also inversed the selection and deleted the excess parts of the images like I'v done before. Then I duplicated both layers so I could flip the image to reveal what each egg would look like on each side of the subject, just experimenting which image looks more realistic and attractive. I decided to use one of the egg images on the left shoulder and the left hip. I thought that I could use another tree image to fill in the white part of the eye and arm but the tree was a different colour so I decided to just use the Clone Stamp tool instead. The shoulder now looks more realistic, as if she was part egg and I think that it looks really good.
I created the leg next, I didn't think that the subject should have only one egg part of the body, therefore I decided to make an opening on the left leg. Firstly, I used the duplicated layer of the shoulder and rearranged it so the egg was in the perfect position on top of the leg. During this process, I flipped the image horizontally because I liked the angle of the egg against the leg. I used the Eraser tool to rub out the egg white leaving the yolk. I did this with only 77% opacity so I changed that to 100% which made it clearer.
I noticed that the trousers were still showing therefore, I Clone Stamped trouser leg out of the image so it revealed just the egg against the tree. I used the Dodge & Burn tool to make a better contrast in the yolk.
Once that was done, I chose an image of an egg to replace the apple that the subject is holding. After selecting the egg and deleting the remaining image, I re sized and rotated the egg so it was the same size and angle as the apple in the original image. I then erased the egg that was overlapping the hand with 50% opacity on the egg layer.
Because I had so many layers, I renamed some of the layer so I was more organised and so it was easier to no which layer is which part of the picture. I then decided to start creating the hip. I outlined the chosen egg with the Polygon Lasso tool and then cut the selection out of the picture. Then I erased the rest of the picture so I was left with just the egg. I changed the opacity to 70% so I could change around the egg position until I was comfortable with the arrangement. I then erased the egg white with the Eraser tool until the white blended in with the subjects top. I put the yolk inwards so it looked like the was a chunk missing however, I needed to remove the subjects top where the yolk was coming out. Therefore, I used the Clone Stamp to copy the darkness of the tree until the top was gone and it gave the illusion of the yolk being part of the subject. Some of the egg white was still obvious so I used the Blur tool with 50% opacity and slightly blurred the egg white into the subjects top. To make the shadows and highlights, I used the Dodge & Burn tool to make the lighting of the egg realistic yet surreal.
I then went to put some egg shells onto the floor as if she unwrapped the egg she is eating and just dropped it on the floor. I dropped one of my egg shell images onto my existing image in Photoshop. By using the Polygon Lasso tool, I cut out the egg shells I wanted. Because I dragged that image into Photoshop, from a file, Photoshop didn't register it as a photograph but as an object. Therefore I needed to Rasterize the layer. I also changed the name to 'Egg Shell 1'. Because the shell looked unnatural against the grass, I used the Eraser tool to rub out parts of the egg shell so the grass from the background layer shows through, making stalks of grass and leaves. To make it easier, I changed the opacity to 42% so I could see both egg and grass.
Once I created the grass in front of the egg shell, I used the Dodge & Burn tool to make the shadows on the grass because the egg shell covered the sunlight.
I then decided to go a bit further and took one of my yolk images and dropped it into Photoshop. I used the Polygon Lasso tool again to cut the selection out. I rasterized the layer and saved the selection to 'Runny Yolk' and then selected part of the image with the Rectangular Marquee tool and deleted that selection. I then clicked on Edit and Free Transformed the original selection after loading it and cutting it out of the original image and then deleting the part I didn't want. I had to then decide which part of the body the yolk should be on and after thinking about it, I decided to go with the leg because it matched the best. I erased the areas that were over the edge and by using the Eraser tool on 40% opacity, I was able to blend the runny yolk with the dry yolk making it look as if the subject is dripping. I decided to lengthen the yolk drip, therefore, I used Edit - Free Transform and made the drip longer. I think that this now looks a lot better and the subject looks a lot more egg-like.
