These girls are members of the Surma tribe in the Omo River Valley of Ethiopia. I photographed them separately, and then when I got home I realized I should have taken a picture of them together. So, I did it in Photoshop. The hardest part was the fact that each original portrait was cropped fairly tightly, so the right and left edges of the frames cut off the shoulders or arms of the girls. That made blending the three images challenging. First, I expanded the working area with Image > canvas size. Then I pasted the three pictures together with Select > all; and Edit > paste. The two girls center and right were holding flowers, so I carefully added additional flowers to hide the truncated edges. I then used the clone tool to blend the backgrounds. Notice all three shots were taken in the same diffused lighting -- otherwise this wouldn’t have worked. I used a 100-400mm Canon zoom for all three portraits, and my settings for the three images were 1/60, f/9, and 800 ISO. Not traveling for the past year has given me lots of time to create interesting composites. My next photo tour to Ethiopia is in March, 2022.
1 Comments
Mar 13, 2021, 10:06:21 PM
Lorraine Piskin - Jim: You just went to Ethiopia...wow...you had your shots, I suppose. This picture is to die for. I'd go back if you could promise me this shot with these girls....I wasn't as lucky...I love the way you talk about how you get the shot...and what you did in post. It makes me feel you're talking to me.... :-).