Examine this lead photo by Peter Funch . You figure, it need to be staged. a faux. A Sony commercial or something. However’s not. Each piece of the photo actually happened…just not necessarily whilst.

Rather, Funch combined a single, unifying element from many pictures he photographed in one spot. And the consequences are something most of us haven’t seen just before his work-some amalgamation of truth and choreography, the individual and the collective.

In the lead shot, the unifying element is obviously balloons. But his other pieces from his collection Babel Tales are just as striking. Sometimes they’re subtle, overshadowed by a prominent center subject:

Sometimes they’re funny:

Sometimes they’re just white:

Sometimes they’re a touch spooky:

So why am I occurring and on about Funch’s work?

The Challenge

Take many photos from a single spot and combine subjects into a single, unified statement. I would like you to do your best to either clone Babel Stories , or to reimagine the technique along with your own touch. (Maybe there’s another element that comes and goes in a gap rather then humans.)

The Method

Time. A tripod. And lots patience in post production.

A camera has to be locked down, grabbing shots in a public place every…maybe 30 seconds to 5 minutes? And this can be key: Be sure to grab a clean backdrop with none or few of your subjects in it. (This should make post processing easier.)

Once you have got quite a few photos, your going to wish to check what you have got, discerning trends or just letting your artist eye let you know what’s important. Then…well the post production is hard. Photoshop pros can share their techniques inside the comments, but I’d recommend starting together with your clean backdrop, then either magic wanding or clone stamping your subjects into the scene.

Then, blending, lightness darkness adjustment. I mean, there’s a reason Funch is thought of as an artist, right?

All of this said, the idea isn’t difficult. And in case you scale your vision properly, it’s something you are able to handle. Oh, and if you find yourself a photographer but horrible with post processing tools, just team up with a pal to address component to the project. There’s no law against it.

The Rules – READ THESE

1. Submissions must be your personal.
2. Photos should be taken the week of the contest.
3. Explain, briefly, the equipment, settings, technique and story behind shot.
4. Email submissions to contests@gizmodo.com, not me.
5. Include 800px wide image (200KB or less) AND a 2560×1600 sized in email. (The 800px image is the single judged, so be happy to crop/alter the larger image for wallpaper-sized dimensions.)
6. One submission per person.
7. Use the correct SUBJECT line for your email (more info on that below)

Send your best photo by Monday, September 20th at 8AM Eastern to contests@gizmodo.com with ” Composites” within the subject line. Save your files as JPGs, and use a FirstnameLastnameComposites.jpg (800px wide) and FirstnameLastnameCompositesWallpaper.jpg (2560px wide) naming conventions. Include your shooting summary (camera, lens, ISO, etc) inside the body of the email at the side of a story of the shot in a couple of sentences. And don’t skip this story part because it’s often essentially the most enjoyable part for us all beyond the shot itself!

[Example photos by Peter Funch .]

If you’re short of even more stuff to photograph, my site Life, Panoramic would really like to publish your portrait of your hometown. It’s OK in case you live amongst cornfields or something.

Source

This post is tagged: amalgamation, Choreography, consequences, darkness, patience, post processing