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  • #1

    Joel Grimes blending technique...

    I have a question about Joel Grimes retouching style... In his tutorials he explains the process, and it looks easy when he does it. Although it's obvious that he shoots models and background separately they blend together quite well in the final image.
    I tried something similar, and it looks like I have a cardboard cutout in front of the background...
    Apart from obvious ( similar lighting and perspective ) - is there another element that can help blend images together ? Here I meant something like glow from the background spilling over the model ( as Rebeca Saray sometimes does it ), or just a bit of grain to tie it all together ?
    Thanks :-)
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  • #2
    Re: Joel Grimes blending technique...

    err, it seems it's too obvious but I don't see it...

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    • #3
      Re: Joel Grimes blending technique...

      I think in this example it's a bit hard because it's not obvious where the light is coming from. We can see the sun setting in the back, so what's lighting up the man? If it were me I would pick a side to make the light come from (or from whatever angle... up, down, anything) and play with that. Overall I think he should be darker so it looks more "evening" and then just work the highlights and it'll look awesome.

      I hope that makes some sense I don't really know any technical terms :/

      Comment

      • #4
        Re: Joel Grimes blending technique...

        Thank you for your thoughts, and I do agree with you to some extent... It is important to suggest where light is coming from...
        When looking at Joel Grimes work one doesn't really get the idea how the person is lit - there is so much light in the background that it looks obvious that some of the lights had to hit the subject as well.
        Also, Joel sometimes makes it to look like person is lit by flash near to the camera ( as when mixing ambient light with flash that makes subject pop out, as it were ).

        Here are another three shots I've done recently...
        Attached Files

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        • #5
          Re: Joel Grimes blending technique...

          Just one observation there is alot of haloing in your mask very noticable in the third photo

          Comment

          • #6
            Re: Joel Grimes blending technique...

            @ Jason
            Thanks for comment. You're right, there is... especially around head and shoulders, and legs... I was tempted to reduce the halo, but somehow it adds to surreal look I wanted to create... but you're right, I'll do version without halo as well...
            I really want wacom tablet, doing this kind of work with a mouse it's like drawing with a bar of soap :-(
            here is another piece...
            Attached Files
            Last edited by JackCarter; 11-14-2013, 03:17 PM.

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            • #7
              Re: Joel Grimes blending technique...

              Aside from what was previous mentioned, from what I've seen of Joel's images images is that the subject and background have been altered to blend the colors together. Probably lots of ways to do this, but they may include desaturation, a solid color layer set to color blend (or other blend mode) then toned down. Glyn Dewis just did a tutorial about taking the bg and creating a layer that averages the color of the entire layer, then applying that to the subject.

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              • #8
                Re: Joel Grimes blending technique...

                My 2 cents - When it gets darker colours desaturate. Sunset behind means shadow in front unless you can hint at another plausible light source. White airbrushed flare behind the arm is out of context. Sometimes just the scale and height of the skyscape can throw things out of whack so that maybe worth another look.

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                • #9
                  Re: Joel Grimes blending technique...

                  Joel uses photofilter layer, in order to even out the overal tone. I'll have to be careful with shadows and flares. As they say, devil's in details...

                  Comment

                  • #10
                    Re: Joel Grimes blending technique...

                    I don't like the Joel Grimes "cutting head" style...

                    Comment

                    • #11
                      Re: Joel Grimes blending technique...

                      Originally posted by flowbox View Post
                      I don't like the Joel Grimes "cutting head" style...
                      what do you mean by ' cutting head ' - chopping top of the head off ? It' OK by me, it gives more of 3d feel to it...

                      Comment

                      • #12
                        Re: Joel Grimes blending technique...

                        Originally posted by JackCarter View Post
                        what do you mean by ' cutting head ' - chopping top of the head off ? It' OK by me, it gives more of 3d feel to it...
                        Yes sometimes is good technique ...

                        But.... I might be wrong, I'm not an expert

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                        • #13
                          Re: Joel Grimes blending technique...

                          Here is one I did literally the a couple of days ago inspired by Joel Grimes. I looked carefully at his work and he uses flares quite cleverly. Also I think the biggest factor is matching colours across both highlights and shadows and also getting the perspective/proportions of the subject and background right.

                          http://designereye.zenfolio.com/img/...46477677-5.jpg

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                          • #14
                            Re: Joel Grimes blending technique...

                            Well done...
                            Yes, Joel uses flares quite well...

                            Comment

                            • #15
                              Re: Joel Grimes blending technique...

                              Have you watched his videos? He's quite specific, everything from the octoboxes and grids to the masking/blending techniques.

                              It's really pretty simple. Where he excels is his attention to details, patience and experience. There are tons of great examples out there (David Hill comes to mind), these guys just spend ages putting things together, evaluating, redoing, etc., etc., eventually you get faster and know how to reproduce.

                              Looking at your image, I'd say that the bg doesn't match the photo at all. Also, you could spend hours just on the dodge/burn to refine the highlights/shadows/depth even before you start with color matching.



                              Watch the videos on Kelby Training if you haven't, JG has many that go through his entire process in great detail.

                              Comment

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