Adam Sund Photo Blog Photography is the new black.

Man on fire – the Photoshop tutorial

I did a poll counting on a different photo site asking the users which photo they wanted a tutorial on, and unfortunately they picked the one I spend the most time on.

The .psd file weighing 663MB had to be reopened. The 34 layers where looked over once again, and I have tried to recreate the process for creating this image. Stay tuned.

Here's the original image of Brian, taken in my small home studio

He was shot on a gray backdrop with my 400d and a 17-85 is usm lense attached as far as I remember.

Here's the setup:

I had my model placed central with 2 hard light sources hitting him from each side a bit higher than him and a bit from behind - 150w lamps on half charge if I'm not mistaken.

I then used a photo I had previously taken of some skies in Copenhagen - converted to black'n'white.

And on top of these two of my own, a bunch of fire stock photos were used, all picked up at Deviantart - great stuff can be found in there.

The wings were also free stock found at deviantart:

Okay, we've got the most basic elements, now let's move on to the editing.

The dear Brian was masked with extraction tool, and then cut out to be inserted in a somewhat larger .psd document measuring 5000x6000 pxl. The background was black, which made it easier to see those masking flaws you always end up with anyhow - layer mask him and paint them out with a black brush.
The now centered man was missing his legs due to the odd black robe(why did I even make him wear that ?), so on a new layer on top of  him, I took a black hard brush and painted a geni like form in addition to the missing legs - later, this served as a guideline for where the flame should be.
Behind him, I added the clouds which I then darkened by painting away the clouds in a layer mask with a soft low flow brush in order to make the black background somewhat visible again.

Beneath the layer of the man, I've made a color balance layer, where the clouds have been make red/orange. Over that layer, I added a layer filled with orange (darker orange in the edges - darkened with burn tool) - blending mode set to overlay and lowered opacity to around 25%.

The man himself has had some color balance done to him to enhance that red/orange feel. To attach an adjustment layer to another, hold down ALT while adding the layer.

The Wings

On the image just above, you can see the different layers used to make the burning wings - all layers with an opacity of 100%, so this image is just to show their blending modes.

To get the skeleton like look on the wings, I've chosen soft light as blending mode -after that I've added a bunch of stock images of fire - placed them somewhat over the wings and then painted back the effect. Layer on top of layer is often a good way to achieve good result regardless of it being fire, rain or sexual interaction.
The feather is also a stock image, which as been set in fire (again, add some fire and paint the effect on)

While doing the fire elements, I would like to underline that there is not recipe to how it's done. All you should do is plaster them on top of your object(s), make the layer mask and paint on and off until YOU think it looks good.

The column of fire is one stock image - blending mode set to screen.

The City

I've got 4 stock images of skylines all with opacity between 50 and 80 % with overlay as blending mode. They are all placed below the adjustment layers so that they have the same color tone. To make the city more ghostlike, I've lightened the image with the Paint with light (PWL) effect as described In this tutorial.

After all of this, the following adjustments are made on top of all the other layers. - note that I've made these adjustments because I thought they looked good - that's not usually that same as what YOU would think, so keep that in mind while adding effects.

On the bottom, you can see two PWL layers where one brightens around the mode and one draws up the highlight on his muscles. I've got 2 layers with a weak orange color (blending mode soft light) and has painted this around him in order to make him stand out. Our eyes are by nature drawn towards brighter objects, so add focus to what you want your viewer to see by brightening it.

Last, I've made the image somewhat darker in the corners, again to keep the attention focused on what goes on in the center. I've also removed a bit of color from his body with a hue/saturation layer and painted it on his body only - it was a but too saturated to my taste.

I always do images like this based on some of my own ideas of how things SHOULD like like and how I remember it looking like. It's a bit harder when it comes to a burning man with wings of fire, since this is a sight I rarely see - that's why lot of the work on such an image is done blindfolded. If you want to try this out yourself, then picture how the done image is gonna look in rough terms - what elements you would like and how they should look. Then work towards this and hold on to that mental image (or even drawn sketch) when you add layer after layer. It can be hard to keep focus on the finished image when you're working with small cuts of fire which is going to cover 1/4 of a wing.
Take some breaks now and then and return only when you really feel like continuing - when you are working on large edits like this, it's not beneficial to feel that you HAVE to get through this. Do it because you think it's fun, then I'm sure the result will reflect that.

Make sure to check out the other guides on the blog:

Photoshop tutorial on portraits

My first tutorial

Spartans - the tutorial