For our first week we worked with the various selection tools within Photoshop and experimented with them, to complete to brief of 'Dreams and Nightmares'. For this Brief we were given access to a variety of copyright free images to work with, to help construct our dream or nightmare. The idea I decided to go for was a very creepy and unnatural looking fish, as a friend of mine had told me of a nightmare they had had about fish walking out of the water and going on a rampage. Due the ridiculous and quirky nature of this nightmare I thought it would be a great idea to work with.
As part of the session we were shown an array of selection tools including, Lasso, Polygonal, Magnetic and Magic Wand. I have used all of these selection methods before and due to the fact that I have used Photoshop quite a bit before I chose to opt for the 'Quick Selection' Tool. After using all the other selection tools in the past I felt that this one worked best for me. Therefore I used this to to begin constructing the nightmare fish. I chose a very generic fish from the selection of images as I wanted it to look very familiar and easy for someone to recognise, allowing them to relate better to the nightmarish creature. I then selected some legs for the fish, which I took from a monkey type creature. I decided upon these legs because they have an amphibious look so work well with the fish body. Lastly I selected an eye from a human anatomy image sheet, I picked this eye as I really like the hypnotic pattern of it and it has quite an alien appearance.
Once I had all the components together I added tonal colours to the creature to bring all the elements together. I added a tint of green to the fish's body and legs to make them look as if they were part of the same creature. Plus I decided to make it green because it adds to the quirky look of the creature and makes it look a bit off, as its not a colour a fish would usually be. Furthermore I added a shadow within the eye to make it look as if it is sunken into the fish's head, which also makes it look quite ominous.
Lastly I added a background to the creature to ground it into an environment. For this I chose to layer a 3 different textures out of the selection I had available to me. I layered them to created a dream like atmosphere that wasn't completely clear. I used the scratched texture as the base, as well as to represent the dream state or nothing being solid and visible. The blue bubble wrap texture is to represent the water and bubbles, the fish's origin. Finally the netted texture relates to nets used to catch fish or the scales of the fish.
I am pleased with my final outcome however there are some aspects of it that I think need some work. For example the shadow within the eye is a bit too strong and makes it look as if it is detached from the rest of the character. Also I think I could have made the legs look as if they were more embedded in the fish, so they looked like they were as one. Lastly the shadow I added underneath the creature adds a softness to the piece which I don't think works with the image, I think it would've worked better either with a solid shadow or none at all. Despite this I do like the concept I worked with, the tonal colours I added to different areas of the creature and the layered background I created.
