Delilah Monroe wrote:
I love this effect.  Can someone help me figure out what techniques were used here?

http://500px.com/photo/5218708

I can tell you but how much time and money do you have

Expression Unlimited wrote:
opening a window?


seriously ....what are you asking about?

Um, the awesome curtain-in-breeze effect?  Seriously, I thought that was obvious.

I think there was a little more to it than opening a window.  Just a guess.

Dan OMell wrote:
1) tripod
2) Brenizer method (4-6 frames with and with no woman, desirably manual exposure and manual focus for the light and DOF consistency of the future panorama)
3) shooting the fabric multiple times at different angles
4) removing any busy details
5) **compositing**
6) cleaning up
7) color grading

the same author's:


http://www.cuded.com/2012/09/wedding-ph … -stelmakh/

An actual answer.  Thank-you.

MC Seoul Photography wrote:
brenizer on things that are moving seems like a giant pain in the backside..

I agree that would be challenging.  Did you have another suggestion?

Krunoslav-Stifter wrote:
Can you be more specific as to what technique you are referring to exactly? The location, the bride, the angle, the lighting the post production?

Uh, this is a digital retouching/art forum, correct? 

So yeah, post-production technique is what I'm looking for.

Leonard Gee Photography wrote:
A great eye
Detailed location scouting
Exceptional styling
Terrific lighting/camera technique
Very knowledgeable post work

Could you be more specific about any one of those things, or were you just going to list the basic components of any great shot and avoid saying anything (I mean *anything*) that might be helpful to someone interested trying something like this?

MC Seoul Photography wrote:
brenizer on things that are moving seems like a giant pain in the backside..

in this particular case, it's not at all. even if you skip a tripod. because the stitching process is totally automatic - a software gonna position all layers (after you picked up the most good-looking ones) properly for you. then you proceed with the most trivial masks possible to reveal / hide the selected pixels -- mostly making sure the curtains pieces are continuous. it's not like matte-painting, and you can use a hard brush and avoid being precise and meticulous (at least in this particular step).

actually, you can skip Brenizer method, and just mirror the left or right part of the scene, and then modify the copied part in liquify and/or free transform tools to make it looking different. but it's more hard to do. you can see some 'liquify' applied to curtains -- zoom in and look at the most compressed parts of the fabric.

there is a chance that the original color tones of the curtains were (dramatically) different, and color matching has been done in photoshop too. it's just easier.

there is a chance also that furniture elements or other accessories have been removed in post-processing too (by clone-stamping, for example, etc.)

basically, it's all about an initial idea and art and/or skills (depending on attitude) of compositing. you can find a lot of info (books, videos, articles, etc) about compositing and matte-painting online, one off the top of my head is here, for example.

personally, I don't see that this image was real (it does not even look particularly realistic perspective-wise, but it's great, no doubt about that), and it's not like the author just made some retouching of a real scene. it's definitely a composite.

Dan OMell wrote:

in this particular case, it's not at all. even if you skip a tripod. because the stitching process is totally automatic - a software gonna position all layers (after you picked up the most good-looking ones) properly for you. then you proceed with the most trivial masks possible to reveal / hide the selected pixels -- mostly making sure the curtains pieces are continuous. it's not like matte-painting, and you can use a hard brush and avoid being precise and meticulous (at least in this particular step).

actually, you can skip Brenizer method, and just mirror the left or right part of the scene, and then modify the copied part in liquify and/or free transform tools to make it looking different. but it's more hard to do. you can see some 'liquify' applied to curtains -- zoom in and look at the most compressed parts of the fabric.

there is a chance that the original color tones of the curtains were (dramatically) different, and color matching has been done in photoshop too. it's just easier.

there is a chance also that furniture elements or other accessories have been removed in post-processing too (by clone-stamping, for example, etc.)

basically, it's all about an initial idea and art and/or skills (depending on attitude) of compositing. you can find a lot of info (books, videos, articles, etc) about compositing and matte-painting online, one off the top of my head is here, for example.

personally, I don't see that this image was real (it does not even look particularly realistic perspective-wise, but it's great, no doubt about that), and it's not like the author just made some retouching of a real scene. it's definitely a composite.

This was very helpful, thank-you for your input.

Robert Randall wrote:
You'll notice that the ends of all the flowing curtains have been cropped off. This could be as simple as two assistants pulling on string attached by clamp to the ends of the curtains. To my eye, the curtains look more pulled than blowing... I could be wrong, but we've done the same effect in studio in the past.

Just because there might be a simple explanation for how it was done, doesn't diminish the image in my eyes. I like it a lot.

I thought about that and I agree.  It makes the most sense. 

To me, it actually makes it more interesting.  The concept of making still things look as though they are in motion is sort of a neat trick I think.

Delilah Monroe wrote:

I thought about that and I agree.  It makes the most sense. 

To me, it actually makes it more interesting.  The concept of making still things look as though they are in motion is sort of a neat trick I think.

You'll notice the inside sheer portion of the drapery is actually what gives a sense of flow to the image. Imagine the other drapes pull/clamped to a C-stand or an assistant, while someone else lifts and fluffs the shears. Pretty simple, and I bet it would be easy to get help from the brides maids.

Robert Randall wrote:
You'll notice the inside sheer portion of the drapery is actually what gives a sense of flow to the image. Imagine the other drapes pull/clamped to a C-stand or an assistant, while someone else lifts and fluffs the shears. Pretty simple, and I bet it would be easy to get help from the brides maids.

It may even be the same curtain repeated several times at different levels to give it that layered effect.  Notice the other curtains in the background.  They almost look to sheer to have that many layers.