Movie Poster

Before starting to work on this assignment, I knew exactly what movie I wanted to take the lead role in...THE TERMINATOR. To start, I simply looked at the pose Schwarzenegger was in on the cover of the first Terminator and just mimicked that pose (minus the gun and black leather jacket), only I was alot less "badass" about it. I had a photo taken in this pose with a digital camera and uploaded the image onto the computer and soon began my work on Photoshop Elements again.

First Fifteen Minutes

After opening the image of myself on Photoshop Elements but still before using the clone/stamp tool, I had found and uploaded an original cover of The Terminator from Google Images. Just so that I could properly use the clone/stamp tool, I needed to resize the image of myself (digital photo images are generally too large!); to resize the image I clicked Image, Resize, Resample Image, Constrain Proportions and then changed the width and length (pixels) to match the dimensions of the other photo (The Terminator movie cover). To start, I had blackened my shades entirely by using the clone/stamp tool (cloning and stamping pitch black areas throughout) in order to make sure that my eyes were not visible. I then cloned the reddish light being emitted by Schwarzenegger's right eye and stamped/placed it onto my right eye. I then used the clone/stamp tool to photoshop the gun that Schwarzenegger was holding onto my right hand; the only challenging part of this task was to stamp the area around the trigger onto the picture so that my finger fit perfectly through the loop (For this I needed a really small brush size and to pay close attention to the details).

Next Seven Minutes

While working on the cover, I thought to myself that I would need to spice things up at some point and let people know my true identity (That I am in fact part man, part cybernetic organism), that being said I uploaded an alternate cover of The Terminator from Google Images; the one that shows half of Arnold's face covered in metal machinery. Again, I resized this image so that it could be compatible with the image of myself and then began to clone/stamp areas of metal from Arnold's face onto the left side of my face and neck, as well as overtop the lens covering my left eye. 

Next Ten Minutes

Now that I was finished morphing myself into the terminator, I opened a separate file that mimicked roughly the exact same dimensions of the actual Terminator movie cover. Using the paint bucket tool, I filled the entire portrait a pitch black colour. In order to fit the previous image of myself holding the gun into the new page, I again had to alter the dimensions slightly; only this time since the picture of myself was too wide, I had to unselect constrain proportions so that I could narrow the image (diminish width without diminishing length too) and thus fit myself into the cover. I then used the clone/stamp tool to clone the movie title, credits and critical praise onto the bottom third of the picture and added the lasers seen on the right side of the cover as well. Also, since I couldn't quite recreate the old-looking 1970's photographic feel to the original cover, I tried my best to still somehow visually distort the picture; I selected effects and artistic and decided to use paint daubs to give a bit of a nostalgic feel. My one regret is that my body does not cover more of the background like in the original movie cover so I would be left with a great amount of negative space present in my version. 

Next Fifteen Minutes

The most difficult aspect of all in constructing this movie cover was to recreate the lasers seen on the left of the cover. I began by using the clone/stamp tool to clone the various laser segments seen on the left of Arnold Schwarzenegger's gun and stamping it onto the same area of my own cover. The main problem with my my movie cover picture was the fact that there was such a great distance between the gun I am holding/my hand and the rest of my body (unlike on the actual movie cover); which meant that more of the lasers would have to be visible on my version of the cover. To complete the lasers, i had to use a very small brush size to clone the area of laser seen on the left side of the gun and stamp it onto the right side of the gun while keeping consistent with the diagonal direction it is running in, this process was quite time consuming for me as I had to pay great attention to the detail and make sure the laser ran in a perfectly straight line.

Last Ten Minutes

Personally, I had no clue where the end of the gun I was holding was located (In the original cover it is rather ambiguous what is the gun and what is Arnold's jacket) so I simply took a guess and clone/stamped the black background onto the bottom area and photoshopped the lasers along this area (as seen above) using the clone/stamp tool (same process as explained in the previous step). The last step I had was to place my name (the starring actor in the film) on the poster, which I did at the very top of the poster. To place the text, I used the horizon type tool and chose Impact as my font for the text (I didn't know exactly what font was used in the original poster). Overall, I was relatively pleased with the outcome of my efforts on this assignment but was rather displeased with the great amount of negative space present (which to me gave a plain and slightly boring look), the lack of lasers in the cover and also the fact that unlike on the original, my body is simply cut-off at the bottom of the cover (rather then the area being darkened to blend in with the overall image). That is all.

- aNdReS mElEnDez