Eye droplets
The eye was shot through numerous water droplets. Altough I didn't know the story, some people thought I got the inspiration from Stephen King's "I Am the Doorw...
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The eye was shot through numerous water droplets. Altough I didn't know the story, some people thought I got the inspiration from Stephen King's "I Am the Doorway" when they saw this image!
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Mar, 2012Views
2086
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Awards
Chatter Award
Featured
Outstanding Creativity
Superb Composition
Absolute Masterpiece
Top Choice
Superior Skill
Peer Award
Genius
All Star
Exceptional Contrast
Jaw Dropping
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LeahStewart
December 29, 2012
Wow! This is seriously so cool. How did you take this? Is it on a window/mirror ?
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Wayne_Sr
December 30, 2012
Awesome work..:~) Congratulations on your feature photo! Happy New Year..:~)
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symphony5
February 10, 2013
Very interesting!I like this photo very much.I have something like this too im interested in this type of photography.any way,congratulations! :) good luck
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Same photographer See allBehind The Lens
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Behind The Lens
Location
This picture was taken in my home studio a.k.a. the kitchen.Time
The image was shot at night. This is not really important except for the fact that there was no possibility of direct sunlight leaking into the image.Lighting
The blue eyed puppet was placed behind a glass plate (see below) and was lit by a single SB-600 flash. I had to flag the flash in order to avoid harsh light falling directly onto the droplets.Equipment
The image was shot with my favorite macro-lens Tamron f2.8 90mm. The Nikon D90 camera sat on a tripod. I placed a glass plate with water droplets between the doll and the lens. As each droplet acted as a small lens, the eye of the puppet was reflected numerous times. The eye in the background is the original puppet eye. This eye is out of focus due to the very small depth of field.Inspiration
The inspiration for this photograph came from challenging myself to shoot a 'big brother is watching you' conceptual image. However after posting it online, someone asked me in the comments if my inspiration had come from one of Stephen King’s short stories. In this particular story called “I’m the doorway”, the hands of a former astronaut show tiny little eyes through which the aliens were looking at our world (you know, Stephen King style). I’d never read this story but I was positively surprised that the original concept of my image was interpreted in a completely different way by someone I'd never met…Editing
Post-processing took place in Lightroom. Apart from increasing contrast using curves and clarity, most post-processing time went into cleaning up the image. There are always dust spots and tiny scratches on glass plates that have been used before. Also, very tiny droplets just look like dust spots so you have to decide if they should be removed as well.In my camera bag
Apart from my Nikon D610 I always take my Nikkor 24-70 which is a great but heavy lens. To complement my conceptual work I'm shooting in my home studio, I love shooting details with my Nikkor 70-200. A couple of years ago I converted an old Nikon D70 to infrared so when there's some space left in the bag I'd squeeze that one in as well.Feedback
Make sure your glass plate is as clean as possible and apply the droplets by using a water spray. Act fast as droplets tend to coagulate and slide out of the frame. Make sure the front of your lens is perpendicular to the plate to avoid differences in focus. Experiment with focussing - this can be quite tricky with such a small depth of field!
