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I’m very proud and happy to write that I now got my very own website! jennyjacobsson.com
Therefore this blog site, http://www.jennyjacobsson.wordpress.com, is put to its final rest and the whole blog is moved to jennyjacobsson.com/blog where I aim to create an even more attractive Photography Blog, both in looks and in content.
For you who already subscribe to my Photography Blog, or if you wish to start, update your subscription to the new site via RSS here, so you don’t miss out on any news, images of events, sneak previews of new work, behind-the-scenes footage, more personal shots from trips and moments in live, and other fun stuff.
Feel free to leave a comment over at the new website or drop me an email at mail@jennyjacobsson.com if you have anything you’d like to say about the site, blog, or something else you would like to share.
Love from Jenny
READ THIS BLOG POST OVER AT MY NEW BLOG SITE!!
And so it was time to answer the next question from my dear readers, and this one is from the delightful Anders Bergkvist, who wrote me a comment in You ask, I tell – The Force of Nature where he wondered “How did you create the levitating impression of your first Explore image?“
The first photo of mine that made it into Explore was the image below. As soon as I noticed this wonderful news I howled! And note that I at that moment was at work… but luckily we didn’t have any guests 
I ran down the corridor like a little maniac to catch my wonderful friends and colleagues Johanna and Maria to tell them and we cheered happily for a moment, before putting on our business faces again 
It was a very good day!
But back to the question… how did I create this levitation? Am I secretly a ballerina?!?
I wish The effect of a levitation can of course be created in several ways. Like in all photography a good goal to create a realistic effect is to always capture something that is real, and avoid manipulation to the largest extent possible. Since our mind and eyes are really good at noticing if something fishy is going on and if light and shadows don’t add up, it’s quite hard to put a montage together and there are a lot of things to be considered (more about that in a future post). If I had been graceful enough (and believe me, I’m not) I would have performed this little jump and at the same time managed to pose and turn my torso slightly to create the body shape I was after. I tried, but I can assure you you wouldn’t be pleased with the result.
Although for this shot I was a bit lucky, or at least I made it quite easy for myself since I didn’t want to levitate beyond belief. I just wanted to take off a little from the ground, like I was floating away. So I needed the shadow on the ground to be created, and I wanted a bit stretched legs, and pointed toes. So I took two kinds of shots. One where I took a little jump trying to create good legs, and one kind where I was happy with my upper body. In Photoshop the two images that I chose was put in two different layers on top of each other. Since the upper body layer needed to be placed a bit higher to match my waist, I moved this layer upwards until it fit (you can see how much I moved it in the 2nd image below if you look closely). When this was done, I hid the “bad legs” from the upper body layer by painting black in my layermask, revealing the jumping legs from the layer below. I lowered the opacity of the upper body layer below so that you are able to see the two images together at once (I look a bit like a ghost).
To finish there were a few details that needed to be clone stamped or patched to make everything seemless in the dress, but that was about it.
So by adding two or more different images into one, you can create the most incredible effects. Give it a try and have some fun with it!
READ THIS BLOG POST OVER AT MY NEW BLOG SITE!!
Every now and then I get questions from my beloved blog followers, Flickr contacts, and/or friends about how I did something, why I did another thing, what my inspiration was, if I got caught doing that incredibly embarrasing thing… And I now think it’s time to start my You ask, I tell! And it’s just as simple as it sounds. You ask. And I will tell. Hopefully not too many embarrasing things
First up is a question I got from Hanna Jakobsson, the amazingly charming author of the blog Fröken Jakobssons Vänner, who wonders “what did you do with the leaves in the tree image?” And I’m pretty sure she is referring to The Force of Nature and how I processed the image to create the effect of the tree.
To leave an exact description of how I edited the tree would make this post far too long and I don’t want to bore you to death. It involved a lot of blurring, curves, levels, saturation changes, brushing, masking, and a few textures. And since I’m all about the visual, I’ve decided to show the process in 16 images.
The difference may be hard to see between some of the images (especially since they are quite small), but it’s there. It might be e.g. the color or saturation of the leaves, the color of different parts of the trunk, or a vignette. And since this image is not only about the tree I included the entire process, also showing the processing of the girl (me). Also, take a look at To surrender to the Force of Nature for a Behind the Scenes of the same image.
xoxo,
Jenny
