Snail's Castle - Photo Manipulation [LMAC 76]

Have you ever felt like your place is way to small, you're lack of privacy and all you wish is huge house... or maybe castle? In today's series I'm giving a life to the imagination, actually, I'm giving some snail a castle, instead of his house. I'm about to explain a process a little bit and show you the way I did this.

Finalized Photo Manipulation

Original Photo provided by @shaka, the host of LMAC

As it's quite obvious, I've masked out the castle, and made a separate layer so I have more control over the Photoshop file and my manipulation. To be honest, my first idea, and first try I'm not sharing here (because honestly it was garbage) was about making the castle on some dope ass place like mountains or some beautiful landscape. That didn't end well so I switched on the plan B - which eventually turned out better.
Sometimes in graphic design it's not about the first or second try. I find all of my finalized designs pretty, and that's the first important thing - that the designer loves his work.

Already a Well-known Routine - Collecting Materials (Photos)

I intended to make a snail some castle instead of his house, actually, upgrading his house with castle so the first step was to find amusing snail photo.

Snail Source

• After just few minutes I found really really nice photo of a snail with a house I really liked, after my failed try of the landscape, this was really refreshing.

A little for the change I'll combine my workflow with finding the right photos. I think I'm going to explain my further workflows this way as it's more natural, it follows the actual procedure I was going through while designing this one. It's all about the improvement at the end.

• I'm going to explain all 3 simultaneously: The first photo is just the mask I've done from the original photo. Played with transform tool (size and rotation) until I matched the element of castle with snail's house well. Used soft brush with reduced opacity to make a nice transition that's not very noticeable.

• After that, probably my favourite technique comes next - Burn & Dodge - the technique I explained in a little more detail in my TORNADO PHOTO MANIPULATION. It's the technique which is great in simulation of real life shading and lighting. That's still the best way for me to match 2 different photos and their light sources.
  I had to tweak "Colors" with Color Balance Adjustment Layera little bit as well.

I was pretty much satisfied with the result because I really allowed myself some time to do it the way it should be done, slowly and precisely. But yet, I wanted one more character in the composition, because it will automatically get more dynamic and amusing. I opted for white dove - making nice contrast from the snail and is very beautiful on its own.

White Dove Source

Perception is by no means realistic, but I made it on the purpose. It's my right on artistic freedom I guess :)

The last tweak and work was to make the whole composition more tempting to the eye by adding particles and doing a neat Color Correction.

Source

Whole design and Photo Manipulation was done in Adobe Photoshop 2020.

• Take a look of my recent Post. For a change, it’s not about graphic design but spending time in nature and restarting my mind The Pure Beauty of Blooming Nature Followed by Rare & Extreme Weather Change

I wish good luck to all of participants of Let's Make a Collage Contest of round 76.

© This content is originally made by @tonac

Have a wonderful day. 💚