The second image here is called Lost and Forgotten. A helmet and sword, lost in the woods for so long, they've corroded away ... which conjures stories, doesn't it?! I wanted to know if I could achieve realistic, credible daylight in the same colors, tones, angles, shadow density etc., as a real, live background photo. The object was to get an image where you're not sure where the real photo ends and the 3D, CG, stuff begins. I think I did pretty well with this ...especially when I tell you, it's just an old fashioned raytrace, I haven't yet gone back to LuxRender. Not too shabby, that.
(The trick is, incidentally, to do 95% of it with one light, and just use a subtle fill-in "sky light" to un-crush the most crushed of the shadows. This really does have one light on it -- a pale yellow distant light standing in for the sun. The effect is very convincing: the foreground looks to have the same lighting as the real-world background. That's a big of woodland at Boroka Lookout, about 800m above Halls Gap, in the Grampians ... neat.)
The book cover art is an old, old idea, from April 2010! While leafing through the old projects I occasionally come across something that could be done soooo much better now...
There is is with fonts, log line and what have you; and here is the original version:
Yes, it's a great idea, but only so much was doable nine years ago. Add in all that experience and skill, a new computer, extra software. I rather like this pirate dude, so well come back to him next time and see what we can do with him too! (She, on the other hand, looks like a right, royal pain in the posterior. One of those "fiery, tempestuous heroines" that would be smothered in their sleep in reality -- or dumped overboard, before they drive everyone nuts. 😜 )
More soon. Am sorting the Grampians photos, and will start to post them to the travel blog very soon. Hehehe ... I just compared my photo work with Shutterstock and Alamy. Mine are better. Can't tell you how gratifying that is!)