North by Star Wars

This was a really strange experiment. When we first got the assignment I brought 3 completely different pictures in, not sure what I wanted to do. Then when we started masking, I decided I definitely wanted this recreation of the famous NXNW scene with Seth Rogen. It's RIDICULOUS! So from there I started thinking what things I could do. I originally wanted to get like a flying saucer U.F.O. and put it behind him. Then have it shooting a barn or something. However I just really didn't like that brown tented background. So then I thought why not in space, and from there Star Wars...

So I started by masking out Seth, which was really difficult because the original desaturated brown exterior matched his suit. So Magic wand was out. Magnetic lasso was just ruining the wrinkles in his suit, so I got out the lasso and went piece by piece. Once I got a rough version of that, I went ahead and threw the moonscape on. I took a short cut and just lassoed a line about halfway across it to make a horizon and knew I would blur it later so it wouldn't look too bad. Then got that space skyline and plopped it on. Then I created a duplicate and placed it atop, did a quick mask and used the gradient tool to make a nice lens blur. I made it kind of light, and changed the shape to 7 sidedp; i also added some monochrome noise, to try and make it a little more 70s Star Wars. Then I dropped the opacity just to keep it from being too harsh. Then I added the Tie Fighter and blurred it a little separately . Followed by 2 layers of lasers that I drew with the line, and set one to screen and one to color sponge. Then I wanted more, so I added the death star. But then, I realized it was in focus so I had to go back and redo the gradient lens blur, which really was much easier the 2nd and 3rd time around (thanks Ben).

I couldn't stop there, so finally came the explosion. I masked that out, then added white dots and dirt that I clonestamped the rock pattern on. From there it was a trying series of radial blurs and now it joins you on my blog. I hope you enjoy the absurdness of this cacophony. I really wish I could've added Seth Rogen's eyes popping like Arnold in Total Recall. Ha!