nocturnal

Tonight there is a full moon up in the sky, so I thought it’s perfect time for me to share an image I have been working on lately!

I had this idea about making an image of someone being up on a ladder that reached to the moon. I didn’t put any more thought to it, until back in April when I visited my family for Easter and I saw this wooden ladder my dad uses mostly for painting. I thought it would fit perfectly for what I had in mind, so I decided to go for it. The only problem was, that there was no one available to go out shooting with me and I could not carry the ladder around on my own. So, I decided to shoot a picture of myself climbing the ladder and later composite it in another picture. The only place with enough light where I could do this was the front balcony. I placed the ladder, put on an old robe that my mother has, and started climbing and shooting. I have to tell you that my house is on a very busy road, overlooking a park, so once again, it must have been a delight for the neighbours and all the innocent bystanders to watch me act like a crazy person. Luckily it didn’t take that much time.

I already had a picture of the moon from last year, which I thought was quite ok, so all I needed was the right landscape shot. While going through my archives, I discovered this landscape that I had shot while going for a late evening ride with my boyfriend on New Year’s day. I thought it was perfect for what I had in time, so then it was Photoshop time. This is the first time I was doing something like this and I wanted to make it look as good as possible, so I took it rather slow. All in all, it was quite challenging, but I am quite pleased with the result. Although I must admit, I would choose shooting on location anytime!

Special thanks goes to my boyfriend for helping me improve the ladder position. I actually duplicated the ladder layer to make it look as if I were on a double ladder, so it wasn’t very easy creating the right angle and such.

I’d love your feedback on this and if you have any tips on this kind of compositing, feel free to share!

I wish you a lovely evening under the moonlight!