Here is a fun one, that was a challenge to work on and it show’s anything is possible with the right amount of patience.  For this composite image, we each shot one another on the bench separately.  Then when we got home, I got to work.  I’ve added the two combined images below for you to see…. Here is what I did.

After clipping Marty from the first photo I added him to the bench where I was and positioned him as close as I could to where he was in the last photo. I had to stretch his wrist a smidge and erase back his fist so it looks like his hand is behind me, and not punching me in the shoulder.  After his placement was correct, I made separate paths around each item of clothing, and then created adjustment layers to open and balance the color for each. I did the same for our skin, the bench, and the surrounding background.  It was here I realized I was missing part of his foot so I created part of his shoe based on another in addition to some shnazzy cloning of bricks, cedar chips, etc… Or as Marty said, “Layed some brick down.”  In theory,  I could have just reversed it, but I had already done some time consuming color work.  I then added some shadows under his feet and seat on the bench so it didn’t look like he was floating… The last piece of the puzzle was to crop it to a square to get rid of the distracting elements, and darken the edges so we stand out. There you have it!!

You can click the thumbnail images below to see larger versions of the before stages.

Camera Info:

Nikon D300/ lens Sigma 10-20/ f4.8/ 1/25sec/ ISO 100/ SB600 strobe flash

*If you have any questions beyond what I explained on how I did the retouching, don’t hesitate to ask!

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 23rd, 2009 at 7:26 pm and is filed under Commercial, photos, Retouching, Tutorials. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.