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Alan Brown's picture

Portrait of Sam

Joe's talk of photography being difficult his time of year guilted me into getting out the camera and trying something new (why not??).

This is an image of my son Sam, who patiently worked with me on my strange requests.

This is the result of 23 images taken around Sam, with both camera and subject moving in unison as we completed a 360-degree circle (hence the relatively sharp facial features). Images were then layered & blended in Photoshop.

Feedback would be welcomed, whether positive or negative. I'd especially appreciate suggestions on alternate subjects for this technique - the subject has to be able to be rotated as the camera moves around it (so that key features are retained).

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8 Comments

That's really awesome Alan, and a very creative way to incorporate something new into your style, very nice.

I spent the afternoon working on fantasy edits of past photos while thinking about where I'd like to visit next.

I wonder if you did a flower? You could attach a subject to the top of a mono-pod and use one of those perpendicular arms and attach the camera to the end of that. Now you can rotate a subject while the camera also rotates in a locked synchronous orbit around the central axis (subject). Could even do two mono-pods and just connect them with a cross bar. Just thoughts, nothing more :)

Thanks Joe. I have actually been thinking about doing a bunch of flowers in a vase. Those can be done indoors sitting them on a stool and rotating as I shoot.
I don't think the alignment needs to be spot on for flowers and the overlap in layers would create a nice effect.

I've recently dipped my toes in the waters of portrait photography, and I will definitely be trying this out in my next photoshoot. This is a great job with a good technique.

Would love to see that Mathew. The trick is to keep the eyes, mouth etc in the same position in the frame on each shot, and to line up the layers when blending in PS.

I was recently looking through some of Pep Ventosa's works, and I found this image. It made me think of your shots of Sam, so i decided to share.

https://www.facebook.com/PepVentosaPhotographs/photos/a.1898263053556720...

Thanks Matthew. That's one of the few Pep's works I don't actually like. It looks way too contrived/extreme for my liking - you?

I'll definitely agree. A lot of the strength of the technique comes from the way that the details blend together. That doesn't happen in the example above. Yours looks better, even if the subject isn't as famous.

I really need to explore this style of photography more; I still love what it dose to landscapes.