Hacking Photography - one Picture at a time
The photo trickery of a levitation shot has been around for ages now, and is a great way to create a compelling image and get in a bit of Photoshop practice while you’re at it!
One of my favourite things is light painting with fire, and the idea of combining levitation into the mix was a fun challenge that was well worth the effort. Read on, and I’ll walk you through step by step how I pulled it off!
I just love those moments when I scroll through my Facebook feed and a beautiful photo stops me in my tracks. This is exactly what happened when I saw this image by Robbie Harvey. So, I reached out to him wanting to hear more about it. I was impressed to hear that it was taken in a single shot, and Robbie agreed to share more details about his photo with DIYP readers.
Levitation photography is a relatively new topic, only really taking off in the last 20 years or so since digital cameras ousted film. But it’s become a very popular one. Often it’s done by balancing on top of objects or suspending from a string that will be photoshopped out later, but there are ways to do it without Photoshop.
Many of the ways to do it without Photoshop just involve good timing (or a little luck). You need to capture somebody mid-jump or an object as it hurtles through the air, but there are other tricks you can do to make it look a little more like levitation. In this 5-minute video, COOPH looks at a number of ways you can help to sell the effect without Photoshop.
Light painting can give a sense of otherworldly to your images, and so can the levitation. But when you bring those two together – it can take you to another dimension. Pennsylvania-based photographer Swen Cubilette brought levitation and light painting together to create an image that captured my attention immediately. He kindly shared his image with DIYP and chatted with us about how he created this captivating photo.
This year, fall kinda caught me off guard. I was in a light summer dress, chilling by the river, and all of a sudden: it’s October! I have to wear a jacket and boots, and days have become shorter and colder. It’s often rainy, cloudy and dull, and for many of us, taking photos is not the first thing that comes to mind in this weather. But there’s a way to spice up your photography even when the colorful leaves and the rare sunny days aren’t on your side.
Rainy, cloudy days are perfect for shooting glowing mushrooms, and in this video, Christian Möhrle will show you how. It’s simple and fun and it can give you some neat results.
Photo and video gear is expensive, we all know that. Still, there are so many items you can buy for less than $50, yet they’re incredibly useful for shooting. In this video, Peter McKinnon will show you six awesome, but cheap gadgets you can use for filmmaking, but also for photography.
For this production with Or Samson we wanted to do something that we did not see before, but we also wanted to raise the technical bar so the photos will not be easy to reproduce.
I was chatting with Adi Kropik (my go-to MUA), and we thought that levitating a female magical goth would both pose a good challenge, but also create some great photos. The art side was “easy”, we are not strange to magic. The technical side, however, was not trivial. We needed to suspend a model high up in the air, while she feels comfy enough to look good.
We did a quick goth in the forest search in google images, just to make sure we are not repeating anything familiar theme, and BOOM! no one has done it before. Getting inspired by Lord of The Rings we went for two looks, a black Goth and a white princess.
A team was assembled (see bottom for full credits) and the production went underway.
Photos of flying or levitating food can look epic, but they seem intimidating to create. However, it doesn’t have to be difficult. In this video, Skyler Burt of We Eat Together will show you an easy way of creating flying food photos.
We’ve already seen some splendid work of L.A. photographer Mitchel Wu. Whether it’s Kermit the Frog or the Toy Story crew, Mitchel’s photos are always humorous and they put the toys in all kinds of silly situations.
For this article, the photographer has prepared a special treat for all the Star Wars fans out there. The official premiere of Star Wars: The Last Jedi is approaching, and this set of photos will be a perfect warm-up. Just like his previous work, this set is also rich in great ideas, and Mitchel pulls off most of them in-camera. He also sometimes merges Star Wars toys with those from other movies, so expect the unexpected!
You know those videos you watch and think: “No way is this real, it must be some kind of magic?” A short movie Box by Bot & Dolly will make you feel this way. It’s an awe-inspiring video created with robot-powered projection mapping on moving objects. It transforms two moving flat panels into all kinds of optical illusions, bending, flying and teleporting across the stage. And as for the interaction of the actor and the illusions – there’s no CGI, but everything was captured in-camera.
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