With my first experimentation with layering images I wanted to create an image that was made up of layers of photographs that all related to the same subject. I chose to do an image about my hometown Letchworth Garden City. Letchworth proudly boasts of being the first garden city, a place that supposedly has the best part of the countryside (the green of trees, grass and field) and the best part of the city (community and shops etc) mixed into one town. To convey this I used a photograph of grass that I sourced from the website http://www.graphicfields.com/textures.htm, a photograph that I took of a flower and a photograph that I took of the Letchworth sign. Using the grass photo as the base layer, I then layered the flower photo, I decided to mirror the flower photo and flip upside down as the flower in focus detracted from the Letchworth sign that I layered on top. I selected the Letchworth sign and deleted the remainder of that layer and then played around with opacities and layer blending modes until all components of the image were visible. Although achieving what I had set out to do with this image, I am not pleased with the final image (below), it is messy and distracting, the photographs used do not work together.
Learning from my previous experimentation with layering images that the photographs were too different to work together I went on to create this image. Using two images that were both taken at the same sunset (above). 
I layered the two images on top of each other, with the fence continuing off towards the distant horizon. This creates an ambiguous and confusing image, as the fence, with all its connotations of confinement, actually appears to lure the viewer towards the freedom of the open sea. Again, however, I am not very pleased with this image, although separately I like the photographs, together, they looks confusing and crowded.
Having discovered in the last two images that over laying two images with separate focal points, becomes confusing and crowded, with this image I experimented with using one strong image and over laying it with a more textured base image, in this case a macro photograph that I took of fire and the texture of the wood that was burning. Because fire is often associated with death and fear I choose to use one of the images I took for my studio module as the second layer. The photograph is a high key, close up of a girl with scary face paint on. The expanse of white on her right cheek is perfect for showing the texture of the wood in the layer behind and the subjects left eye is looking through the a flame at the viewer which also works well. In order to create this image I simple layered the two images on top of each other and changed the opacities of the two layers until I was happy with the image.
With this image I wanted to try conveying two very different and conflicting scenes together. The base image is in fact an HDR image I created of a sunset from out of my halls living room window for use later in the project. When creating the image I edited it in such a way that created a lot of black around the edges of the image, this hid the Leeds skyline and all the buildings that were originally visible. This allowed me to present the sunset as if it was in a country setting. I achieved this by selecting a windmill, from a photograph I took back home, using the magnetic lasso tool and then copying the windmill over into the sunset image in another layer. To the windmill, using the lightness slider in the hue saturation window, I darkened it completely in order to create a silhouette. I then added another layer that consisted of a photograph that I had taken of a brick wall; I lowered the opacity of the layer in order to reveal the layers below. The bricks were layered over the top of the image to ruin the country sunset and demonstrate the on-going debate over environmental issues – the paradox of a texture with inner-city connotations and the rural nature of the image’s other components appeals to our concern with the environment as human activity damages it. The addition of the bricks, however, resulted in the windmill being more obvious as the bricks layer was lighter and no longer allowed the base and top of the windmill to drift into darkness. This made the windmill look very fake and resulted in all three layers looking very separate. So having initially wanted the bricks to show the contrast between city and country I decided that the image is much stronger without the addition of the third layer. 
I created this image purely to experiment with layering patterns into an image in order to create depth, texture and interest. The figure, building, tree and sky are all from the original image, which I used as the base layer. I then inserted two more layers, a blue coarse textured layer and a black and white pattern, that I applied soft light blend modes in order to reveal the base layer. I positioned the centre of the pattern over the figure’s head; this is to draw the viewer’s attention to the figure’s face and away from the distracting background of the tree and building. I then erased the part of the pattern layer that covered the figure’s face. I chose to retain the textured layer that lay over the figure’s face to stop the figure looking too apart from the rest of the image. I am not pleased with this image, although I like the angles used in the original photograph, the added layers add too much distraction and the subjects hair and figure is too over exposed.
Using what I had learnt from the last image, I tried to create a similar image with a sunny blue sky and textures, however, this time the focus lying on buildings instead of a model. Above are the original photographs of all the layers I used, the final image before I applied the textures and the textures used. I selected, copied and pasted each building on to the image of the sky, tree ad plane, and then used the free transform tool to position each building correctly onto the image. I flipped the red building in order for it to fit underneath the tree and draw the focus towards the plane that is now flying between the buildings. Once happy with the positions of the buildings I then added the two images you can see of blue textures as separate layers – the textured images I again sourced from the website mentioned previously. I applied a soft light blend mode to each layer and played with the opacity of each layer until I was happy with the final image.
The two original images, shown above, are both taken with my macro lens again, they both have vibrant colours and a close focus. I wanted to have the tongue going towards the sandwich as if to lick it. I first achieved this by trying a technique I learnt in one of the workshops. I layered the tongue image over the sandwich, and rubbed out the rest of the layer. I positioned the tongue where I wanted it using the free transform tool, and then, using different opacities, tried to blend in the tongue so it didn’t look as fake. The result was not very effective; it looks unsmooth and very fake.
Not being pleased with the final image, I redid the image this time using a different technique. I selected the tongue using a selection tool. I copied the selection over as a new layer and then free transformed the tongue into the right position, this time choosing to make the tongue slightly less wide. In order to blend the two layers together successfully, with the tongue layer selected I selected the perimeter of the tongue, I then applied a small Gaussian blur, this allowed the edge of the tongue to discreetly blur with the background image. I also applied small manipulation of colours and contrast to the sandwich layer to enhance the vibrancy of the image. The resulting image is vibrant, colourful and playful, with two strong focal points and a big depth of field, which a camera would be unable to capture.
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