MarzJ-Texture

=__**Original Photos:**__=

=__**Final:**__=

While creating this picture, I was working off of the idea of peace after death. I wanted to create a scene that had a somber and somewhat depressing feel to it-- mainly invoked by the gravestone and the gray hue of the photo-- but was at the same time peaceful, and almost happy in a sense-- seen in the overall nice landscape of the photo. To help achieve this sense of peace, I had the entirety of the photo shaded in an olive green hue with heavily reduced saturation-- as olive green is a color that generally represents peace.

When editing my photo, I made a variety of changes in order to arrive at my final product. To begin, I adjusted the brightness and hue of the photo that featured both the leftmost tree and the background I ended up using. Succeeding this, I removed a somewhat small rock that stood in front of the leftmost tree by means of the spot healing brush tool-- as the rock was unnecessary, and took away from the natural feel of the grass. Proceeding this, I cut out the rightmost tree from its photo, pasted it into my background image, and adjusted its hue and brightness in order to make it look similar to the tree on the left. My next step was to remove the gravestone on the right of my background image-- as the tree made the gravestone somewhat irrelevant-- and add in a road, fence and ground behind where the gravestone one stood-- tasks that were achieved through use of the clone stamp tool and the spot healing brush. Following this, I removed the gravestone from the center of the photo-- through means of the clone stamp tool-- cut out another gravestone from a different photo, and pasted that gravestone where the original photo's gravestone once stood--which was done due to the new gravestone being more prominent and appealing than the original gravestone. After this, I used the burn tool on the left side of the new gravestone in order to make it look as though the gravestone had a shadow on its left side. Once that was complete, I used a combination of the burn and dodge tools on the right tree in order to give it a more proper balance between shadows and lighter portions. Additionally, I used a combination of the clone stamp tool, the burn tool, and the paintbrush tool on the bottom of the right tree in order to have the tree better blend into the ground it stood on. Afterwards, I added in snow and grass around the gravestone in order to better integrate the gravestone into the photo. Subsequently, I added in shadows behind the rightmost tree by means of a low opacity paintbrush tool-- done in order to further integrate the tree into the photo. The final step I took was to once again adjust the hue and saturation of the entire photo in order to unify my creation-- thus completing my image.

In this picture, the primary compositional technique I used was framing-- seen in how the trees in my photo frame the gravestone, which is the subject of my photo. I decided to incorporate framing into my photo, as I felt that framing the gravestone would aid in getting across the message of my photo-- which is that death, although certainly upsetting, is a natural and, in a sense, peaceful occurrence. Another compositional technique used is seen in the form of leading lines, in how the natural lines and edges of my trees and my gravestone lead the eye upward-- towards the sky and the heavens.

The final picture I ended up creating features a few different textures. Such textures include the rough and ragged feel of the photo's trees-- meant to represent the potential harshness of death-- and the smooth and mellow feel of both the photo's grass and the photo's gravestone-- meant to represent the potential peacefulness of death. Other art elements seen include value-- found in how the olive green hue of the image creates various different types of the same color-- space-- seen in the balance between the positive space of my trees and my gravestone in the foreground and the negative space of my background-- and line-- seen in the leading lines of my trees and the sharp lines on my gravestone. Art principles featured in my image include balance-- seen in the balance between my foreground and my background-- emphasis-- in how my photo's framing emphasizes the importance of the gravestone-- movement-- seen in how my photo's leading lines lead the eyes upward-- and unity-- in how every aspect of my photo relates to my concept of peace after death in one way or another.

Overall, I feel that my final product turned out fairly well. I felt that my rightmost tree ended up blending with the ground well-- as it looks like it could be a natural part of the landscape-- and I felt that the desaturated olive green hue of the piece ended up looking very nice. However, I also feel that I could have done a better job of adding in a background behind the right gravestone of my original photo-- as some parts of the fence in that area appear to be slightly awkward.