The Moon's a Balloon
Nov, 2015Views
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Awards
Action Award
Contender in the Visual Poetry Project
Legendary Award
Contest Finalist in Fantasy In Color Photo Contest
Contest Finalist in Post Editing Magic Photo Contest
Runner Up in A Fantasy World Photo Contest
Contest Finalist in A Fantasy World Photo Contest
Staff Winter Selection 2015
Peer Award
Outstanding Creativity
Superb Composition
Absolute Masterpiece
Top Choice
Genius
Superior Skill
All Star
Magnificent Capture
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Behind The Lens
Location
This is a composite of 3 images, all taken on the same day in the Indre-et-Loire region in France in Summer. The child on the ladder with the landscape was the first image, then moon was the second and the starry sky was the final image I took to create this scene.Time
The main part of the image was taken at sunset, with the moon taken just after the sun had set, and the stars taken much later in the evening when it was fully dark. As the components don't usually appear at the same time, I had to stagger the shoots throughout the evening. The idea was the higher you go in the image, the later it is in the evening.Lighting
Because of the subject matter being a romantic concept of "the moon's a balloon" I wanted lovely soft and warm light so shot this a sunset, when the sun is low in the sky. It is all natural light.Equipment
I used a Canon 70D for the images for this composite with a Canon EF 70-200 2.8L. The camera was mounted on a tripod for the image of the stars, as it needed a longer exposure to capture them, so I had to keep the camera still, but the others shots it was had held, as they were a much faster shutter speed.Inspiration
The original concept of this image came from a line in a children's Christmas story book, where it described God as an artist. The sentence "He pulled down the night sky.." gave me the idea of a child on a ladder pulling down a blind with the moon and stars on it over a sunset scene. When I played around with the concept, the blind was too much of a solid block in the sky, and it did not work. Then I thought of the scene in "A Wonderful Life" where George lassos the moon and from there I thought of the title of David Niven's memoirs "The Moon's a Balloon". Suddenly the idea became clear and I changed the moon to a balloon, so it is really an idea own from 3 separate concepts.Editing
There is a lot of post production in the image. The original image of the child on the ladder was given a golden pink glow in Photoshop, and I added a gradient layer to change the colours from a dark blue through to pink. I then added the stars as a new layer, and then masked the image of the moon, before applying the mask and liquifying it to form a balloon shape. This was dragged onto my image as a new layer. I resized the tie from a balloon and drew in the string so it connected with the child's hand. I softened the moon slightly by adding some gaussian blur, to be in keeping with the depth of field of the main landscape part of the image. Finally I did some dodging and burning over the whole image, and added some subtle mist/smoke with a brush to give it some atmosphere.In my camera bag
I have a canon 6D, a Canon EF 70-200 2.8L, a canon EF24-105 f4 and a canon 2x extender which is useful when I need wildlife for composites. I also try and carry a reflector and a grey card, and at least one speed light, as you never know when you need an extra bit of light.Feedback
Think about the atmosphere you want to create in your image and decide what time of day best suits this. Also it, is very important the the light is in the same direction in all the components for the image, and you also need to think of perspective and depth of field if the elements in relation to one another. When I create a concept image, I try not to become overwhelmed with the entire image and exactly how I will get it to work. I like to focus on it step by step, one element at a time, so that it does not seem like too big a task. I have had a lot of experience in photoshop, and suggest that people wanting to create this sort of image, just go for it. Photoshop might seem scary at first, but just have a good play with it, and you will soon get the hang of it.
