Daily 365: Saguaro
This is a collage began with a closeup photo of lichen on rocks I shot while hiking. I’m really interested in the way lichen appears on rocks.
The sky is built from a paintbrush stroke in Illustrator and a cloud brush from Photoshop, and the sun is a fill texture from Photoshop.
The saguaro is built with the pen tool and a burlap texture.
Very cool idea, especially the top right hand part of the lichen mountain.
But the narrow depth of field, throwing the lower left side of the photo out of focus, kind of messes up the illusion.
Solution: for a closeup like this, be sure to use a tripod and do a longer exposure. That should allow you to shoot with a very small aperture, like f16 or f22 — which will give you much greater depth of field in your photo. That’s not always possible in an extreme close-up, but it’s worth experimenting with.