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Is this image showing a photographer surrounded by apparently-floating camera gear Photoshopped, or was a special technique used?

enter image description here

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    \$\begingroup\$ Pentax users have super powers, its a well established fact. \$\endgroup\$
    – rfusca
    Commented Apr 16, 2014 at 14:49
  • \$\begingroup\$ But terrible judgement... ;) \$\endgroup\$
    – ElendilTheTall
    Commented Apr 16, 2014 at 15:19
  • \$\begingroup\$ I would encourage you to post a comment on his picture and ask directly. \$\endgroup\$
    – rfusca
    Commented Apr 16, 2014 at 15:57
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    \$\begingroup\$ "Technique, i used for this photo: Telekinesis :))" It seems this answers your question :D \$\endgroup\$
    – Kevin
    Commented Apr 16, 2014 at 16:47
  • \$\begingroup\$ Please see PSA on “What's this effect?” questions and edit your post accordingly. Thank you! \$\endgroup\$
    – mattdm
    Commented Apr 16, 2014 at 22:33

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I'm the photographer, who made the picture, and I used Photoshop to make the strings invisible holding the lenses.

This is not a composite. The picture was made from 1 shot. The CE logo on the lens confuses people, because it looks like it's upside down, but actually it's reflected from a mirror.

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Photoshop has certainly been used somewhere along the line. Either the 'floating' lenses and flashgun were photographed separately in the same lighting conditions and then composited into the main shot, or the photographer used string or fishing line to suspend them somehow and then Photoshopped it out.

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    \$\begingroup\$ Or he just dropped the lenses on a pillow and took a picture "in flight"... \$\endgroup\$
    – Oleg
    Commented Apr 17, 2014 at 9:35
  • \$\begingroup\$ @Oleg Yep, my first thought. \$\endgroup\$
    – SaturnsEye
    Commented Apr 17, 2014 at 9:38
  • \$\begingroup\$ Yes. I used strings for this picture. Not compositing. \$\endgroup\$
    – Ajnagraphy
    Commented Apr 23, 2014 at 16:27
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It is photoshopped or gimped or whatever. On the lenses you see color fringes which probably come from working with slightly inaccurate masks on the composing.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ It isn't a composite. The color fringing is caused by the lens i shot with. Cheap Cheap manual lens... \$\endgroup\$
    – Ajnagraphy
    Commented Apr 23, 2014 at 16:14
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The lenses are most likely hanging from black cotton thread. That would be easy to edit out, if it was even visible at all. In particular, the lens on the left is at about the right angle for being suspended by a loop of thread around its top end; the one on the right looks like it would need two strings to support it.

However, having now read Hugo's answer about the CE logo not being mirrored, I now agree that the "floating" lenses were photographed separately and edited in. They may well have been hung from cotton thread to take that photograph: if they were arranged on a table, for example, the photographer would have had to edit out a lot of shadows. Oleg's comment made me realise that rotating a CE logo by 180° has the same effect as reflecting it so we can't tell if the logo is reflected or not.

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The easiest way to compose it in photoshop is by photographing the lens and flash on a contrasting background (e.g. bright green) and then use the mirror shot as a background. You can clearly see this is photoshopped because there is no reflection of the lenses in the mirror. There is also a depth error on the flash (it looks like it's behind the guy's hand). Also the text on the lenses is not reverted (you can see a clear CE logo on the left lens). The image is also heavily compressed (look at the low range of colors in the darker areas), compression often helps to hide composition artifacts.

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    \$\begingroup\$ You're right -- the CE logo is the give-away. \$\endgroup\$
    – David Richerby
    Commented Apr 17, 2014 at 7:14
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    \$\begingroup\$ I'm sorry, but how come the CE logo is not mirrored when it clearly is? \$\endgroup\$
    – Oleg
    Commented Apr 17, 2014 at 9:46
  • \$\begingroup\$ @Oleg Rotating the CE logo by 180 degrees and reflecting it both produce the same result. Hugo and I looked at the backwards logo and assumed it had been rotated; you looked assumed it was reflected. But, actually, none of us can tell. \$\endgroup\$
    – David Richerby
    Commented Apr 23, 2014 at 16:03
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    \$\begingroup\$ It was a mirror trust me. I shot th picture :D \$\endgroup\$
    – Ajnagraphy
    Commented Apr 23, 2014 at 16:24

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