Concept Development - Photo Bashing

 This composition began with a photograph of clouds as the background. I had this idea of a mountain pushing through the clouds, with a castle atop it.

 Using a small image of a cliff I added a layer mask and removed any unwanted areas. This image was then duplicated and pushed into the desired areas.

 At this point I introduced the structure. Again I used a layer mask to remove any unwanted areas. A soft round brush was used with a reduced opacity, allowing me to blend the image with the images behind it.

 I wanted a winding path that lead up to the structure on the mountain. For this I found an image of a path and pushed it into position, removing any unwanted areas with a soft round brush. The cliffs either side of the path are also a separate image, this image was altered in a mask and duplicated to build up the effect.

 At this point I started to correct the colour values of each image, attempting to make it seem as if they belong together. This was done using hue and saturation layers with clipping masks, which is good because it is none destructive.

 The light source needed pushing further, in order to bring all of the images together. This was done using a soft light layer and a multiply layer. I had painted highlights in the soft light layer, anywhere that I thought the sun would be hitting. A dark colour was used on the multiply layer to imply shadow areas.

Finally I added a curve layer, pushing some of the dark's and lights further. A levels, hue and saturation layer were also added to push this effect even further. For the colour scheme I wanted bright colours, much like what would be seen in a fantasy illustration. As I checked over the image I realized that the saturation of the building needed pulling back slightly, this was done using a clipping mask.

Clouds were added around the base of the mountain using a custom cloud brush. This was just to push the idea that the mountain is high in the sky. I used a very low opacity for this, building up the cloud effect only in the areas that I thought necessary.

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Bibliography

Chinese clouds (2008) [Photography]. Available at: https://kedarphotography.wordpress.com/2008/11/03/chinese-clouds/ (Accessed: 16 March 2016).

Craig, R. (2007) Love of Scotland [Photography]. Available at: http://loveofscotland.blogspot.co.uk/2010_05_01_archive.html (Accessed: 16 March 2016).

I castelli -classici medievali- hanno sicuramente... - Il Nido di fuoco(2015) [Photography]. Available at: http://gaya-ingves.tumblr.com/post/115749242257/i-castelli-classici-medievali-hanno-sicuramente (Accessed: 16 March 2016).

(no date) [Photography]. Available at: https://www.travelblog.org/Photos/5755193 (Accessed: 16 March 2016).