Laticis Inspired

In my opinion, Laticis is already among the best Studio users around, but his daily tests and experimentations just keep helping him get better. I've been frustrated with my lack of consistancy with Studio lighting and materials, so I'm starting to move towards improving my Photoshop skills to make up for this and get satisfactory results regardless of the mask and color correction madness that it will inevitably require.

This is just the result of about an hour and a half of separate light rendering and postwork testing inspired by this Laticis image. I can't hope to match his realism, so I thought I'd stick to my usual super-secret Curves and some light layer masking for a more painterly result. Just stuck a candle photo behind him to match the edge lighting (which was originally blue). No individual material masking this time, just overall color correction and some Camera Raw. I'll probably try this basic method with Smacky later and see how it goes.

I just needed a quick break from my big action pic (which is coming along more quickly now, hopefully shouldn't take too much longer). Thanks for taking a look!