Multi-faceted personality

A nice series of work by an Italian photographer Maurizio Galimberti. He used Polaroids for these, of course you don't have to use Polaroid film.

For this assignment, you will shoot it digitally and composite the images using an image editing program.

How to shoot such an image:

Decide on the structure of the resulting grid. Suggestions:
7x5
5x7
7x10

Images must have a great deal of overlap.


You will have to be very close to your subject. You must be able to focus closely. Don't get so close that your camera can't focus.

Your depth of field become more shallow the closer you are to your subject. Thus, you should stop down as much as possible  (use the smallest aperture that you can get away with) to maximize your depth of field.

Perspective must change a lot between each shot.

Consider if you want your subject to remain in a static pose or not. 

Image shot under diffuse lighting if possible (avoid strong shadows on part of the face). 

Start with a 3x3 to get a feel for the results. Assemble it.

From there, get increasingly complex.

If even one image is blurry, throw it out and make a new one. 

How to assemble the images:

Edit all the photos in Camera Raw. Synchronize them so that all the edits are the same.

Save a downsampled copy of all the files as TIFFs into a single folder.

From within PS, import the images into Photoshop as a Layer Stack. 

Files > Scripts > Load Into Layer Stack.

Increase your canvas size. Final image should be at least 5000x5000 pixels.

Move your images into place.

Use a grid or 'pixel shim' to place your images correctly.

Save the multi layered image as a TIFF.

For class, take a 3x3 and quickly assemble it. If that looks like it will be good, then just leave it as it is for completion next class. If it came out poorly, then shoot another 3x3 and try to loosely assemble it just to assess your shooting. Only then move onto the more complex 5x5 (or more) images.

By next class, shoot images for an assemblage of at least 5x5 images. No need to edit them or attempt to assemble them yet. Please spend some time looking at the portraits on the website to which I linked above. I think the 5x7 images look particularly good, but you can go nuts and shoot a 10x10 if you desire.

Next class we will go over how to fully assemble them and spend more time discussing resolution.

I would like you to try to show multiple facets of one's personality in this collaged piece. Consider half of it shot with one hair style, facial expression, clothes, makeup, whatever, and the other half of the images shot with a change of one of more of those elements. You may want to shoot 5x5 of both 'dress ups' and then choose which ones to combine later.