Stompbox – Photography by Kirk Stewart

It may be frustrating for some that this isn’t an actual tutorial, but the real deal on some of these images is that they are EASY. More or less, you could create something similar with basic masking techniques in Photoshop. It’s not tough stuff.

The purpose of adding graphic elements to photos is up to you. Does your client want ‘something different?’ Do you want to make art to hang on the wall? It doesn’t really matter why you do it, but the fact is you can do some amazing things to photos and make them look completely different using Photoshop or other software. Let’s take a look at a few that I’ve done. These were just for fun.

First, I used a pretty cool picture of one of my favorite guitarists, Joe Satriani, which had a lot of negative space and decided to use that area for some graphic elements and typography. Here’s the original photo:

Pretty good stuff, right? Using very simple masking, vector shapes, free brushes, and a basic sans-serif font, I added to the image a a sense of motion, impact, and excitement. I also made the image monochrome to draw out the texture of the wall and the high detail in the image. Here’s what I ended up with:

Nice. I dig it. Let’s move on to something more drastic, where the final image has only a vague resemblance to the original photo, and you may not have even guessed that the final image came from a photo at all! You can find a very large library of free stock photos and graphics at sxc.hu, which is where I found this creepy photo of a gothy looking girl screaming exaggeratedly:

I had already decided that I wanted to try to make a cool Resident Evil style zombie image, inspired by the work of illustrator Stephen Gammell, so I opened my original photo in Photoshop, and went to work. Admittedly, this one took more complex knowledge of Photoshop, but not much. I used the the selection tool exaggerate just the shape of the mouth with the warp tool, lots of textures and blend modes, brushes, masking, and layering. Bypassing an outbreak or years of bio-research, here’s the zombie I created:

Click to see the finished zombie image larger

BRAINS! Somebody call S.T.A.R.S! Ha! So you can see that with some experimentation and very, very simple Photoshop tools, you can transform and enhance your photos in amazing ways.

When faced with editing your photos, is it like once again entering the world of survival horror? Leave a comment below!

I was digging through the ol’ digital shoebox of photos, and I found this one from about 5 years ago. I was playing guitar at a Christian youth camp with a band assembled of musicians from several churches. It was great fun, and Lisa snapped this great photo of me whippin’ the lash! Oh, the Hair-manity!

This weekend I’ve had the pleasure of attending a 2-Day Directing Workshop taught by director Darin Scott.
I’ve learned a lot for sure, but I have to say that I’m glad that not everything is completely new to me. If I had discovered on the first day that it was going to be all completely new information it might have felt overwhelming.
The good news is, I’ve got a solid foundation in this stuff, so a lot of Darin’s information is just great ways to organize and build a process for things I already know.
In particular, I’ve very much enjoyed the sections of the workshop dealing with casting, actors, rehearsals, and working with actors on set. Yesterday, we had some actors in attendance who demonstrated some scenes for us, and then how the director can shape the actors’ performances through direction. Much like photographing a skilled model is a pleasure, watching a skilled actor perform is way cool experience.

Perhaps most importantly, I wouldn’t have even been able to enjoy and experience this workshop without the kind generosity and invitation of my friend Juju, who is hosting the event at Juju Foto Factory. Thanks so much, Juju! The value is not lost on me.

I’ve been talking about and sharing stories from my experiences at Juju Foto Factory for a while, and now here’s something new and cool to share! I’m on the Juju Crew! It looks like I’m officially the Music Events Organizer for the studio. Right now we have our very successful and popular ‘Shoot the Band’ monthly event, and I’m looking forward to creating new events as well! Check me out! Juju Crew!

This was captured in a little fair trade, local artisan goods shop in Battle Creek, MI. We were looking at all of the handmade jewelry and gemstones and whatnot, and when Lisa walked by this glass case, the light coming out of it was kind of magical, so I flapped the shutter a few times. I was pleased to get this cool shot.