Photography:
Third Place, Most Creative

Christopher Lee Donovan
Rochester Institute of Technology

Over-Looking

Artist's Statement: The concept behind Over-Looking is a simple one that is a reflection of one of my personal philosophies. It is that "the answers we seek do not manifest themselves in the words of others; every answer we have ever sought, we have always had."

When shooting this image, I thought of it in "layers." To begin, I shot the figure against the wall as the "background." Then, as there were only four books in the background image, I shot two more stacks of books and added them as layers to the image. This was done on location in Photoshop so I could adjust for factors such as perspective, lighting and depth-of-field in the camera. Following the books, I photographed a small clay head and an old padlock, which were then layered over the face. After all of the elements were shot and I had left the location, I did all of the montaging in Photoshop and added other subtle elements, such as the text on the bookbindings. The final image was then output to an Epson 1270.

Adobe® Photoshop® combined with digital capture (all done on a Phase One Lighphase) made it remarkably easy to assemble the image and maintain proper proportions, perspective, lighting and depth-of-field with no guesswork. I knew exactly what I had when I left the location.