Photo Editing

Photo Blending & Editing

This is from a play set in Iowa, where a family struggles over who will inherit the family farm. Not far beneath the surface of famliy arguements is the death of a son on the night the tree was struck. That son is now on a pedestal in his father's mind, and the living son rages against an ideal that he can never reach.

The challenges in this image were creating a dramatic night scene lit by lightning from a daylight photo. After darkening the image through various methods, I had to clone over the original tree sun shadow on the hillside. A new lightning shadow had to be created, making sure it did not appear flat on the uneven grass and brush.

The original lighning strike image is from a NOAA website. I loved this cloud formation, like an avenging angel, but the image was a bit washed out and grainy. I worked carefully with Photoshop curves and painting to enhance the richness of the night sky and the drama of the cloud formation. I enjoyed playing with the lighting effects silhouetting the tree as the lightning strikes and runs through the branches.

The original two images:

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