green warlock

Frustrated by a lack of appropriate backdrops for my fantasy compositions I decided to shoot an up-angle using the sky itself as a background. The slight-fish-eye, forced-perspective produced by an Opteka wide-angle lens attached to the 18-55mm kit lens opened wide is my (feeble?) attempt to reproduce the over-the-top, primeval power and suggestiveness that I find so attractive in a Frazetta painting or a Richard Corben illustration. Tech: the camera is mounted on a tripod and fired with a remote set on 2 second delay to allow me to pose and also to conceal the remote. Green skin is a hue adjustment; I kicked up the blacks using levels (new trick Khan1066 showed me), added a bit of diffuse glow to stir up the sky and darkened everything to hide unwanted detail (glasses, jeans...). I'm pretty happy with it--especially by the way I was able to downplay the "spare tire" while allowing the last vestages of my flirtations with weight-lifting to come through, all by fine-tuning the shadows. I will probably be removing wires and the part of the house visible in lower-right corner before I consider it "finished." Fresh after criticizing Khan1066's newfound interest in textures I'm also thinking about being a complete two-faced hypocrit and introducing a parchment texture to the sky. Too much? What about using a layer effect + red diffuse glow to set the eyes of the serpent staff (excellent prop bought at a bargain-basement price from the Halloween Store!) 'afire?

Done