The Carriage Tutorial

I took this about a year ago on Decater St. in New Orleans French Quarter. Stuck in traffic and this dude came by, I didn’t think it was much of a shot at the time, but after a lil bit of a tuneup it’s become one of my all time favorites and has been feature in a few different galleries, the biggest being the Los Angeles Mobile Arts Festival back in August of 2012 http://la-maf.com/about/. So since I get a lot of questions on it and I’ve seen a few try and duplicate it, I figured I’d spill my secrets.

Taken with Pro Camera on an iPhone 4s

Apps needed: Camera+, Photo Forge 2, Tilt Shift Gen, Modern Grunge, Superimpose.

Total time: About an hour

Step 0 ) New Orleans. YOU can’t get this shot without New Orleans, so don’t bother unless you’re there!

haha ok ok, for real though…

Step 1 ) I took it with Pro Camera (my number 1 camera replacement app) using the “fullscreen trigger” option, perfect for street photography and shots on the go cause you don’t have to look at the screen to make sure you hit the shutter button. Cropped it to a square to get rid of the cars around the sides.

Step 2 ) I brought it into Camera+ and used the clarity scene to sharpen up a few areas and darken some blacks, and then added the black and white effect.

Step 3 ) I jumped over to Photo Forge 2 and added vignette number 4, turned it up to about 75% to darken the background and bring your focus on to my subject.

Step 4 ) Next over to Tilt Shift Gen where I added the elliptical blur around the outer area of my subject, to even further draw your attention to him and get rid of more of the ugly background. Adjusted the contrast and brightness a bit.

So I’m left with this, which is how I was gonna leave in intentionally. But I decided to keep going anyway.

Step 5 ) Next I moved over to Modern Grunge and made a few adjustments, finding the pattern and intensity that fits the photo best but without overpowering it. This one works for me, any stronger and it’ll take away from the picture itself, something I always try and avoid at all costs. Some people just edit too much!

So this is how it looked after that. Even though I was careful I still felt like it was overpowering and my subject was darkened and kinda blended with the background too much from the Modern Grunge. So that needs fixing.

Step 6 ) I took the photo that I had from right after using Tilt Shift Gen and opened it up in Superimpose, then layered the one from after Modern Grunge over top of it. Opened up the masking tool (brush) feature, adjusted the size of the brush and and smoothness, then started to trace around my subject of the carriage and horse, bringing the brighter photo without the grunge as my subject and leaving the grungy photo as the background. Save, then look at it and marvel!

The finished result, thank’s for reading.