Flowers and Candy: Feasibility Study

I opened my desk drawer and noticed a platter (from a laptop hard drive) and I flashed on the scene from "2001: A Space Odyssey" where the Pan Clipper (Orion III Spaceplane) flying from the space station to Tycho Magnetic Anomaly (TMA-1) and the "stewardess" picks up the floating pen that drifted away from a sleeping Dr. Heywood Floyd.

The magic of the floating pen was accomplished by attaching the pen to a piece of circular glass and then rotating the glass during the scene.

I love F/X and how they are done.

I was wondering along the same basic principle, but instead suspend a highly reflective disc in front of something and place something of contrasting color in the reflected view.

The first step was not to worry about capturing the perfect image, but see what the reflection would look like. Lighting was not a concern either.

First photo:

I moved the bouquet of flowers from the center of the table and placed black cardstock beneath and behind.

Next was using thread and painter's tape to suspend the shiny disc at a pleasing height which looked like the center of the lower section of the vase. I tried a 45° angle for the disc, however the disc appeared too oval in shape.

Once I got the angles right and the distance between the reflected image and the flowers the same focal distance, it was time to snap a photo.

I think I underexposed by one stop because the room was full of bright sunlight.

Second photo:

Quick editing to tone down the reds/oranges/yellows with both saturation and luminosity. Removal of the background with Exposure and Shadow Sliders and a couple layer masks.

Flip the image so the reflected writing isn't backwards.

Final photo:

Replace the background with an AI generated background and a bit more tweaking with masks.

Looks more like a Hallmark greeting card.

This is what happens when I can't take my camera for a walk.