Michelle Sobolewski - Under the Influence

 

portfolio website

Instagram portfolio

For the Under the Influence Project, I found many photographers interesting; however, none inspired me more than Ryan Sims (@Ryansimsphotography on instagram and youtube). Ryan Sims is a digital artist and photographer from the Nashville area. He is a professional with over 10 years of in-industry experience, making movie posters and advertisements for various clients. Along with this industry experience, he mostly focuses on cosplay photography.

 

His photography and editing have a strong fantasy and comic book influence, manifesting itself through the subject matter, setting, and effects. All of his pieces are character-focused, with the figure always the main center of attention. A majority of his portfolio consists of action shots, focusing on the figures in movement and capturing dynamic poses in his photography. He also blends photography with digital compositing in an interesting way as the figure is often someone in a costume captured in a photograph while the background is different, likely edited in-post. Instead of editing the figure, Ryan focuses on editing the environment around them to tell a story, ranging from epic battle scenes with magical effects to more calm moments in a fantasy/medieval setting. 

On a technical level, the color grading depends on the scene and the character, but oftentimes leans towards bright colors. He often uses strong lighting along with high contrast editing in post to create an intense feeling in his photos. There is no obvious preference between landscape or portrait photos, using whichever orientation fits the theme of the piece and the character better. If the background is an important staging element, then it would be landscape, but if it is focused more on the character’s expression/upper body, then portrait orientation would be used.

Megan Cluck - Under the Influence

 

Ron Schmidt

Ron Schmidt is a commercial and fine-art photographer best known for his Loose Leashes series, where he creates humorous and imaginative portraits of dogs placed into human-like scenarios. Rather than simply photographing animals in costumes, Schmidt builds each scene using compositing techniques that allow the dogs to appear as active characters within a narrative moment, such as water skiing, paddling a canoe, or standing inside a goldfish bowl. His lighting style is clean and bright, and his compositions are simple and centered, which helps keep the focus on expression and character rather than technical distraction. His work is playful and approachable, making the animals feel charming, expressive, and recognizable as personalities.

Schmidt’s imagery relies heavily on digital compositing. The dogs, props, and environments are often photographed separately and then combined in Photoshop to create a seamless final scene. For example, in SKIP, the dog on water skis, the rope, and the reflective water surface are layered together with matched lighting and added shadows to make the pose look believable. In Lewie & Clark, ADVENTURERS, the canoe, river, paddles, and tennis ball are composed to create a sense of movement and teamwork between the dogs. In MOBY, the dog, the goldfish bowl, the water, and the background are blended carefully, with transparency and glass distortion effects reinforcing the realism of the composite. These examples make it clear that Schmidt does not rely on staging alone, his work is shaped by digital layering, masking, and color grading.

For my own project, I want to build on Schmidt’s use of personality-driven storytelling through animal portraiture. I plan to photograph my dog and composite her into a character role, similar to how Schmidt assigns identity and narrative to his subjects. Like Schmidt, I want the humor to come from presenting the dog seriously within an absurd or unexpected context, rather than exaggerating or making the image cartoony. I also want to use a clean, bright color palette and clear compositing so the final image feels polished while still being fun. By working in Schmidt’s style, I can create a portrait that is lighthearted, expressive, and visually cohesive, but still technically grounded in thoughtful compositing.

Under the Influence Research - Lucy Yeates

Joshua Hoffine

https://www.joshuahoffine.com/

Joshua Hoffine is an American photographer known for his staged horror photographs that explore childhood fears and the darker aspects of the imagination. Hoffine blends multiple photographs to create seamless, hyperrealistic scenes that feel both cinematic and unsettling. Hoffine often constructs elaborate sets, using actors, costumes, and props, which he later enhances in Photoshop. This allows him to push the boundaries of realism, creating photographs that resemble film stills rather than static images. His use of lighting, shadow contrast, and saturated tones gives each composition a heightened sense of tension and atmosphere.

Hoffine’s images are characterized by their careful composition and narrative clarity. Works from his series “After Dark My Sweet” (2003–2010) demonstrate his skill at directing the viewer’s gaze through the use of light and spatial arrangement. Whether a child hiding under a bed or a figure lurking in the background, each element contributes to telling a story. Hoffine often uses low camera angles and deep focus to create a sense of immersion, as if the viewer were inside the nightmare. His color palettes typically feature muted browns, greens, and grays, punctuated by warm highlights, evoking the visual tone of classic horror films.

I especially love this type of work because it explores fear as a shared human experience. He draws inspiration from fairy tales, horror cinema, and psychological archetypes, often using children as protagonists to emphasize the vulnerability and intensity of early emotional experiences. His photographs balance theatricality and realism, forcing viewers to confront their own subconscious anxieties. In my project, I plan to extend Hoffine’s techniques by experimenting with compositing to merge fantasy and reality. Using Photoshop layers and color grading to build surreal scenes that explore the theme of memory and distorted perception, I want to create images that feel both familiar and haunting.

Under The Influence Research - Jacob Taylor

                         

Magdiel Lopez

Link to Website: https://www.magdiellopez.com/

In these four images, Magdiel Lopez chooses landscape as his main subject in addition to skyscrapers. Lopez uses saturation, hue, line, and shape to contradict nature with man-made structures. The high saturation in the last three images brings a mystical nature to nature. In stark contrast, the saturation in the first image is muddled and brings a daunting quality to the imposing nature of the skyscrapers on the mountains. The use of lines demarcates land and airspace. It also calls attention to the weight of man-made structural forms on surrounding nature. The shapes add character to the mountains in the last image, and highlight the magnificence of the power of nature in the second and third images.

Conceptually, I believe Magdiel wants the viewer to acknowledge the impact that mankind has on nature, including their relationship to it. Nature is powerful, bright, dark, and full of character. Many times, we think we have figured out nature, but in fact, we've just scraped the tip of the "iceberg".

I wish to extend these elements on my own for my project by juxtaposing man-made forms like buildings, bridges, etc. With forms found naturally, like streams, boulders, and fallen trees. The focus will not be a parasitic relationship, but a complete relationship with parasitic and symbiotic traits. I will play with saturation, but to a lesser extent. I want to use saturation to help show a more raw relationship, not polished for presenting to the world.

Under the Influence Research - Aalayna Southerland

 Carlos Jimenez Varela

Portfolio: https://jimenezvarela.com/work

My inspiration for the Under the Influence Project is Carlos Jimenez Varela.  Carlos is a photo compositor and High-End retoucher from Costa Rica. By trade Carlos is a Graphic Designer and worked in Advertising for 17 years in both Costa Rica and Panama. After, he turned to freelance to showcase his photo compositing skills. He won gold at the Latin American Design Awards 2021 for his works that featured giant sneakers in places they normally wouldn’t be in. This win gave him the opportunity to work with many brands such as Adobe, New Balance, Puma, and more. 

As a shoe lover the majority of Carlos’s work focuses on putting giant shoes in odd places. While he does have some work that have different giant objects like crowns, strollers,and sunglasses, his main subject is shoes. His work is almost cinematic because of the angles he uses as well as the color grading. Most of his work is client work and therefore are mainly to advertise the releases of shoes/ other apparel but he does a great job of storytelling through his composites.

In my own project I want to experiment with scale and produce something that looks cinematic similar to Carlos’s work. In most if not all of his work, the shoes/ apparel are placed in an outside environment. I want to change the environment and place giant objects inside buildings. I would also like to tell a story about my objects and their environments. 

PUMA Suede Dubai

Selehe Bembury x New Balance 574 Yurt

Saucony Grid Azura 2000 by Jae Tips Photo Composites

Under The Influence - Aiden Stanford

 

https://www.magdiellopez.com/

Magdiel Lopez is a digital artist whose work relies on compositing, bringing together photography, graphic design, symbolism, and bright color. Through his portfolio, Lopez creates dreamlike images by combining reality with abstract shapes and forms. Lopez often works with bright pallets with neon colors and gradients that shift from warm to cool. These choices give his work an atmospheric glow.  

Formally, this work shows a deep understanding of photoshop compositing techniques such as masking and color grading. Lopez also relies on repeated patterns and shapes to create rhythm throughout his compositions. 

Conceptually, his work seems to explore ideas related to cultural identity and futurism. His use of birds and organic patterns could suggest themes of transformation. For my own Under the Influence project, I want to build on the works and ideas of Magdiel Lopez by using similar methods of merging photography with symbolic graphics. I plan to work with shapes, gradients, and textures to achieve this.  

Under the Influence Blog Post - Liz Taylor

Under the Influence Blog Post

Artist: Luis Dourado

The artist I have chosen for my under the influence blog post is Luis Dourado. Luis Dourado is a Portuguese illustrator and visual artist known for his surreal, sci-fi-inspired photo collages. His work feels like a one-man assault on realism, transforming everyday portraits and landscapes into strange, otherworldly images. He blends photography, collage, and digital manipulation to explore themes of memory, perception, and identity. Many of his pieces feature obscured faces, layered textures, and symmetrical compositions that distort reality just enough to feel dreamlike. His art often captures a tension between the familiar and the fantastical, like a memory that feels real but looks slightly altered in your mind.

Dourado’s style relies on muted tones, geometric fragments, and bursts of bright, almost cosmic color. He often uses symmetry, repetition, and soft gradients to create balanced yet unsettling compositions. The result is a sense of both order and distortion, as if the viewer is caught in a glitch between two worlds. His use of Photoshop and compositing techniques; such as layer masking, blending modes, and texture overlays—allows him to merge photographs seamlessly while still leaving hints of manipulation. The mix of analog imagery and digital editing gives his pieces a handmade feel, even though they exist entirely in the digital space.

For my project, I want to take inspiration from Dourado’s surreal compositing style and apply it to my own experiences traveling and studying abroad in Lyon, France. I plan to combine my own photos of the city with overlays of text, patterns, or symbolic elements that represent memory and translation. Like Dourado, I want to create something that feels slightly detached from reality. Less like a travel photo and more like a dream or recollection. By experimenting with subtle distortions, mirrored imagery, and layered color effects, I hope to build a piece that reflects how travel changes the way we see familiar places, blending what’s real with what’s remembered.

Luis Dourado Website: https://luisdourado.studio/