Photoshop Project

Another assignment for MD400 included creating an image using Photoshop, in order to demonstrate ability to do one or more of the following: explore perspectives, visualize similes, illustrate principles with self-portraits, place self in literature or history or use an improbable scene as a writing prompt.  I chose to begin with a favorite image of my four-year-old niece, Kayla.  Here is the image I began with:

Kayla in the kitchen

As you can see, Kayla spent her playtime that day dressing up as a Hawaiian dancer to hula in her kitchen.  In the background, the stairs, garbage can and coffee maker are visible.  To create a new image using Photoshop, I chose to take Kayla out of the kitchen and put her in a more likely place for a hula dancer: the beach.

To do this, I had to first use the crop tool to delete much of the background, as close to Kayla as possible.  Then I increased the image size so that the picture would appear larger and, therefore, easier to edit.  Next, I used the eraser tool very carefully (using a multitude of eraser sizes) to delete the remainder of the background so that only Kayla was visible.

Beach scene

In order to find a picture of the beach, I used Google images to search for beach photos.  I found one that I liked, which included a palm tree in order for me to explore perspectives by resizing the photo of my niece.  The beach scene I used is displayed on the right.  I chose not to add any more picture layers to my Photoshop image, as I wanted to keep it simple... and keep the focus on Kayla!

Next, I selected a quotation that best connected two of my favorite things, both shown in my Photoshop image: the beach and dancing.  I chose to use the following quotation from William Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale: "When you do dance, I wish you.  A wave o' the seas, that you might ever do nothing but that." I found that this allowed me to not only experiment with perspectives, but also with time, as I put my niece, born in 2007, in a scene with a quotation written in 1623.

After resizing the image of Kayla to fit under the palm tree and on the beach, I changed the font color and size, and saved my work as a .jpg file.  I enjoyed having the opportunity to explore Photoshop and learn to use the different tools available.  Here is the finished product: