"Fleeting Perspectives: A Paper Ballet" Part 8

PIECING TOGETHER THE PAPER BALLET

I finally worked out how to make the shadows for the Paper Ballet series transparent. Or shall I say, I finally carved out some time to think through how to make them transparent. I am determined to see this project through to fruition and it is this last hump that I knew was going to take the most time. Having selected all 15 backgrounds, 26 dancers and 13 shadows - I began by trying out different tools in Photoshop to see what was going to work the best and most efficiently for this project.

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I began by selecting the shadow and placing it on a white backdrop. I isolated the subject so I could clearly see the soft edges. Working with a diffused object such as a shadow is challenging and time consuming, since carefully selecting the edges and making them look natural takes some patience and skill.

Paper Dragon by Edith Ann Green

After several hours of fussing around with different tools and masks, I worked out the following recipe:

1.      Remove subject and place it on a new layer at its original size
2.      Duplicate the layer, select it and fill it in with black
3.      Add Gaussian Blur
4.      Add a mask to the top layer and use the gradient tool to blend the layers
5.      In Multiply Mode, set the opacity of the top layer to 40% and the bottom layer to 22%
6.      Drag this new shadow into the final back drop
7.      Adjust color, opacity, size and placement in the final layout

Working in layers, I then took my dancers and moved them onto the 16 x 16" backdrop that had been preselected. Then I placed their corresponding shadows behind the dancers but in front of the background to create the optical illusion of a shadow. It wasn't until I placed all the elements together that I could work out how to approach the final size and balance I was looking for. In the above screen grab, I initially thought I might make the dancers smaller on the stage. But playing with their proportions to the stage and to each other, I ended up preferring a larger scale for the dancers to occupy and fill the stage.

Lastly, I worked on the opacity and once again scale of the shadows. I initially thought I would want to make them prominent, almost an entirely additional character on stage. But now that I am actually working with them, I have decided to allow the shadows to work on a more subconscious level. Hopefully a more subtle reference of their shape and form will develop in the viewers mind and allow them to draw their own inference between the dancers and their shadows, through our collective subconscious.

With one down and 14 more to go, I'm on my way to seeing this project through to completion this summer. I will be editioning archival pigment prints of the entire set of 15 images and will hopefully find a space to exhibit them at the end of the year.

Paper Is Dead, Long Live Paper!

Julie Pavlowski Green
June 7, 2014