Snow Patrol - Toy Photography Behind the Scenes

Snow Patrol, toy photography.

Hello and welcome back to another behind the scenes toy photography video! This week I'm going to show you how to make a composite image. I call this shot: Snow Patrol.

For this shot I used 2 Snowtroopers and an Imperial Probe Droid from Hasbro's Star Wars the Black Series.

I began my setup by scattering some all purpose flower on to my ground surface. Flour is a great substitute for snow, but be careful when using it, because it gets absolutely everywhere. Don't mind the forest backdrop, that was from another photo and won't be visible in the final shot.

I then placed my probe droid as close to my camera lens as possible to achieve my close up. I used a magnifying filter on my lens which allowed me to place my toy within inches of the lens while still maintaining focus.

I placed my troopers and their bike further back to ensure the shallow depth of field would create some blur on them.

With my toys in place, I positioned a white foam core board in the background. The board served a double purpose as both a reflector and a placeholder for the icy scenery I planned to composite in during editing.

With the scene set I moved my lighting into place and got ready to shoot.

Here's my starting shot. In addition to adjusting the lighting, my plan was to edit in a whole new background, and add a reflection on my droids main eye.

I began by adding a levels adjustment layer and cranking up the contrast before adding a colour balance layer to give the scene more of a blue colour grading.

Next, I imported an image of an icy lake and used a layer mask and a very soft-edged brush tool to brush the layer in. I also blurred the layer to compensate for the dpeth of field, and reduced the opacity of the layer so that the blue wouldn't overwhelm the rest of the shot.

When I was happy with how that looked, I began experimenting with different images to make my reflection with. I wanted to use a scene from the planet Hoth if possible, to connect this image to The Empire Strikes Back. I tried out an image of the Rebels Ion Canon, and while I liked the reflection effect, the scene itself wasn't working for me.

I tried an AT-AT as well, before finally settling on a far away view of Echo Base, making it look like the patrol was an advance team doing reconnaissance on the Rebel stronghold.

Thank you so much for watching.

Music:
The Hunting by FSCM Productions | https://fscmproductions.bandcamp.com
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