Nazgûl - Toy Photography Behind the Scenes

Описание: Nazgûl, toy photography.

Hello and welcome back to another behind the scenes toy photography video!

This week, I'll show you how to make a spooky forest scene. I call this shot: Nazgûl.

For this shot I used a couple of old Wringwraith toys released by ToyBiz in the early 2000s.

I've made a whole bunch of forest scenes in the past few years, and while they're generally pretty easy, I do think I'm getting better at it, so I figured I'd share what I've learned.

I like to use a digital background for these, but if you have enough props and resources, you might not need to. The best part of procuring props and resources for a forest scene, is that you can get a lot of stuff for free just by walking around outside.

This tree stump, for example, was from a big raspberry bush that was growing through my fence. We had to hack into a million pieces to remove it from the fence, and many of these pieces were useful as props.

Store bought props can be great too though. I bought these squares of grass and mossy boulders from a craft store for dirt cheap.

This moss is both real and store bought! I keep it in a sealed container to keep the moisture in.

And finally I created some trees by propping up a few small broken branches.

With the scene set, I shut off my room lights and got to shooting.

I haven't been able to find a decent small scale fog maker, and atmosphere spray is a little pricey around these parts, so in order to add some spooky ambience to the scene, I lit up some incense and waved it in front of the scene, just out of the camera's view.

Here's my starting image. No major edits were required for this image, I simply wanted to adjust the lighting and make a few easy touchups.

I began by using content aware fill to remove some small gaps around the image, including the articulation joints on my figures.

Next, I added adjustment layers for light levels. I really cranked the black levels, because I wanted my final image to be very dark with most of the definition picked out in highlights.

Using the dodge tool, I enhanced some of those highlights, like the ones on the sword blades, to make them stand out more.

After that, I used a custom brush tool to add a little more fog in the foreground. I blurred the layer and reduced its opacity to make it appear more realistic.

Lastly, I added a colour balance adjustment layer to tone down the greens a bit.

SO once again, here's my starting image. And here's where I ended up!

Thank you so much for watching.

Music:
Surrounded by Hayden Folker |   / hayden-folker  
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