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TECHNIQUES PRO PHOTO EFFECTS

LIGHTING, TEXTURE AND REALISM

All the experts seem to agree that if there’s one

single factor that makes a good manipulation, it’s

lighting. As Bush says, “The lighting makes or

breaks my pieces and that’s why I focus a lot on

dramatic and authentic lighting.”

“I always try to make the light have a purpose,”

explains Johansson. “I often shoot in natural light and if

I use strobes I normally try to make them look like

natural light. We just have one sun, one key light, for

my work. I prefer to keep the light simple and focus

more on what is happening in the scene. When

shooting in sunlight it’s especially important to be

Iprefertokeepthelight

simple and focus more on

what is happening in the scene.

When shooting in sunlight it’s

especially important to be

consistent with the direction

(heightandangle)ofthelight

Erik Johansson,http://erikjohanssonphoto.com

USING TEXTURES

After Zach Bush created the foreground and

background and had added weapons to this image

of his wife, he says, “[I] needed to dirty her skin up

so it looked like she just been through battle. I

used red paint splatter textures for her blood and

set the layer effect to Overlay and then for the first I

used the same red paint splatters and changed the

colour of them with Curves and changed the layer

effect to Multiply.”

Creating his own texture photos is something

he’s keen on, for which he tries to look at

everything around him in different ways. Once he

had to create a zombie’s arm. As he says, “Who

knows what their insides look like? There’s not a

ton of flesh wound photos out there, and I can’t

take my own photos of that, but I do have a

banana and I can twist that banana, shred it, dye

it, mash it, make it into whatever I want.”

ROUGH UP YOUR WORK

AND MAKE IT FEEL REAL

consistent with the direction (height and angle) of the

light.” And that’s why artists who shoot their own

material have the advantage from the off. Nascimento

says that “Usually light is defined before the start.

When we are in the concept stage we already have

light direction and colour temperature in mind.” When

he has to work with stock images, he often finds it

easier to “illustrate the lights and shadows to make it

look more integrated. For all of the cases, is essential

to have references to follow.”

Of course, texture is also important. The real world

is dirty and gritty and imperfect, and images need to be

too – if they’re really striving for believability at least.

For Kubicki, it’s also “crucial to know the effects that

you achieve with traditional art techniques, like oil

painting, acrylic painting or ink in reality... It’s important

that you pay close attention to textures and don’t leave

any marks that could expose the manipulation... When

you combine objects, remember they have to become

one in the end: think of the light direction, granularity,

image noise, contrast, saturation.”

Every manipulation isn’t equal, and every

manipulator has a different goal in mind anyway.

For Johansson, “realism always comes first. I

© Zach Bush

always tries to ensure that the Outside In: Erik Johansson

light in his images has a purpose

Alien: Drama is important to

© Brandon Cawood Cawood’s imagery, and so is making the fantastical feel real

© Erik Johnsson