a conceptual photo composite illustration by Michael Maersch


Blind Faith

For as long as I can remember I have been a great admirer of Alphonse Mucha’s illustrations.

Blind Faith’ is my first Mucha-inspired photo composite (photo-montage) incorporating his use of a prominent, figure-outline and illustration-framing strategy. The challenge, in my opinion, is for us all to use other artists' work as inspiration without slavishly copying – derivative pieces, not flat-out plagerism.

My Lightroom-Photoshop workflow here utilizes two versions of the figure I finessed initially in LR then added/subtracted, one from the other in PS; additional effects layered over/under those two.

And by the way, I want to credit the lady who's original photo I used for this composite illustration, "Gemma", who's work can be seen on her Deviantart.com page.

Those of us who work as composite-illustrators are MUCH INDEBTED to generous artists like Gemma. Thank you.