| Teresa Lunt used a variety of compositing and masking
techniques to create her own distinctive vision of a woman
dreaming of tropical paradise.
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Begin by downloading the 3 MB compositing.zip archive and extracting the city.jpg, beach.jpg, woman.jpg, clock.jpg and sunset.jpg images. Open city.jpg and beach.jpg. Crop the
beach image, then drag it into the city image. Use Edit >
Transform > Scale to widen the beach image and again on
the city layer to align the horizons. Add a layer mask to the
beach layer by choosing Layer > Add Layer Mask > Reveal All.
Use the Brush tool to paint away the mask to reveal only the
water and sand and name the layer "water." Drag the clock
image into the composite and position it as the middle layer.
Choose Image > Adjustments > Shadow/Highlight and set the
Amount to 50, Tonal Width to 42, and Radius to 30. Add a
layer mask and paint out portions of the mask to reveal the
clock emerging behind the buildings.
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Open sunset.jpg, crop the sky, and drag it into the composite.
Move the layer below the clock and position the sky
at the top of the canvas. Use Free Transform (Command/
Ctrl-T) to adjust the size. Change the layer blending mode
to Difference to add brilliant color and eliminate deep shadows.
With the Rectangular Marquee tool, select the bottom
of the sunset and Scale it to cover more of the image.
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On the water layer choose
Image > Adjustments > Hue/
Saturation and move the Master
Hue slider to 180. Choose Yellows
from the pull-down menu,
and select the foreground of the
image with the Eyedropper tool.
Move the Hue slider to 153, and
increase its Saturation by 70 to
produce a sunset look in the
ocean. Choose Edit > Transform
> Skew and Scale to stretch some
of the sand off the canvas. Pick
rose as the Foreground Color,
select the Brush tool, and choose
Color as the blending mode in
the Options bar to paint more
warmth into the water. Use the
Brush tool on a layer mask to
soften the edges of the water.
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Choose Image > Adjustments > Curves on the clock layer to
remove the blue color cast. Target the Blue and Green channels
and drag each of their curves down slightly. Then raise the composite
RGB channel curve. Use the Magic Wand tool to select the
black pixels of the clock hands and numerals, and choose Edit > Cut
(Command/Ctrl-X) on the layer mask to allow the black pixels of the
clock face to show through. Paint some of these pixels back in on the
mask, leaving just the numerals and hands over the golden buildings.
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Drag the beach image into the composite, and crop it to leave
only the palm tree and the sky. Use the Magic Wand tool to select the
sky and choose Edit > Cut to remove it. Position the palm tree in the
sand of the water layer and Scale it. Duplicate the layer, chose Filter >
Solarize, and fade the effect by changing the blending mode to Color.
Adjust the color using Hue/Saturation, moving the Master Hue slider
to –46. On the duplicate layer, choose Filter > Liquify to distort the
palms and foliage.
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On the image of the woman, choose Image > Rotate
Canvas > Flip Canvas Horizontal and crop around the face.
Drag the image to the composite, position it, change the
layer’s Opacity to 50%, and set the layer blending mode to
Darken. Open the Hue/Saturation dialog box and move
the Master Hue slider to 16. Add a layer mask and paint
around the edges to soften them. Use the Liquify filter and
the Clone tool to stretch the woman’s hair to the left. To
balance the image, resize the palm layer. Select the bottom
portion of the water layer and stretch it downward to align
the tree’s shadow with the tree. Use the Clone Stamp to
paint water over the sand, and crop the image. The final image is shown at left (click to enlarge).
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Teresa Lunt is a computer
scientist at the Palo Alto
Research Center in Palo Alto,
Calif. She is also a devoted
photographer and passionate
digital artist. See more of her
work at TeresaLunt.com.
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