Dec 13, 2011 Posted on Dec 13, 2011 | 1 comment

Splash Experiment Thanks To Corey Barker

I have wanted to add a water splash effect to an image for the longest time… and had no idea how, until I got Corey Barker’s new book ‘Photoshop Down & Dirty Tricks for Designers’. Chapter 3 has a tutorial on how to do it, and it ain’t easy, at least for me. Hence my less than stellar results. My biggest mistake was choosing an inappropriate start image. It just looks wrong with the splash added. Aside from that, I find displacement maps (the technique Corey uses) quite challenging. Hopefully, I’ll persevere, ’cause my dream is to one day produce images like Danielle Tunstall.

Some may think that I have already tried this technique, because it does look very similar to several of my other images. I used brushes (check out DeviantArt – lots of brushes there) for those and not a displacement map. The reason the effect may look identical to what I have done before, is because I did not do such a great job with this new technique

After:

Side by side comparison:

Close up comparison:

Lighting Info:
AlienBee AB800 with 20° grid on each side of the subject (about 4′ behind him)
AlienBee AB800 in 22″ white, socked beauty dish boomed in front of subject & just overhead
Lastolite silver reflector chest level
Triggered with Paul C. Buff cybercyncs
White seamless background (subject was quite a bit away from the background)

Photos by Regina Pagles

One Response to “Splash Experiment Thanks To Corey Barker”

1. Henriquefz says:

   December 21, 2011 at 1:22 pm

   Hi Regina, I love your work! How you extract the subject from the background? I try many ways without success… Sorry for the poor english.