First of all, sorry for my frog's english... Don't hesitate to correct me.

CONTEXT
I had no idea when I took all the images in this picture. I went to the island of Oléron this summer and I had to take some pictures of a friend surfer.
The good point is that we woke up early most days to go to the beach, a good time for the "golden hour" light is the best in the morning. This beach is full of blocos who served in World War II, so I've taken a few pictures

THE PICTURE
Set :
Nikon D90
Lens 1 : 14-24mm f/2,8
Lens 2 : 105 mm f/2,8 macro
Speedlight SB600
Tripod for macro pictures (hands).
Right now, I'm not good enough to know what I have to do with all that stuff and button in photography, I've to take many pictures before having a good result, so most of the time I use P mode on my camera. I'm learning and I love it !
First of all, I try to have a good composition thinking to the foreground and background, trying to have good light, great focus and nice depth of field : all the things we can't modify/ edit with RAW files or in Photoshop.

To create this image, I've used 10 pictures:
- 1 photo of the beach with a surfer on the right taken with a 105 mm f / 2.8 (the base of the main picture for atmosphere)
- 2 photos for blocos and 1 photo of the beach for more material to the ground snuff with a 14-24 mm f / 2.8
- 3 pictures of hands taken at 105 mm f / 2.8 with a SB600 speedlight (tripod and remote control)
- 3 photos of a crow I photographed 2 years ago with 14-24 mm f / 2.8
As I said, I've taken all those pictures at different moments and the idea came after when I was working on hands and gestures.

To compose final picture, I use some "rules" :
- The rule of thirds (3 hands, 3 birds and the horizon a third of picture).
- I try to imaging where the light is coming from to create shadows if it's necessary and compose with picture who can match together (same point of view).
- I try to have something interesting in the foreground, in the middle plan and in the background.
- A painter friend told me that if we want to tell a story in our picture, it's better to do it in our reading direction (past event at the left and present at the right of the picture), so I've listened to him.
- To place hands and surfer, I use third rules too (vertically this time).

PROCESSING
I'm using a Imac 27', a Wacom Intuos A5, Lightroom to sort and adjust my images quickly and when I've to create more complex details, I'm using Photoshop.
Maybe I can use Maya for 3D contents, but at this moment it's too far from photography I guess. I create editing pictures, but I also really like simple and fine photography with great light, focus, doff and composition.

I've worked on a 70x40 cm format with a 240 dpi resolution.

Main atmosphere :
I've used the atmosphere of the surfer and blocos pictures because the morning light seems to be interesting. The browns tons of the ground match good with the blues tons of the sky, a good contrast in my opinion.
I've tried to NOT saturate colors, on the contrary I've desatured the blues tons and added some green in my sky to be more dramatic.
Most of the time, when I edit a picture,  I put some green, blue or purple in my shadows tons and some yellow in my light tons using the "color balance" layer in Photoshop. It depends of the final atmosphere we want to create at the end.
I've started with the big blocos picture and add the surfer one at the right of my scene.
The problem was that I haven't got enough ground under the body, so I've added another beach picture for my foreground sand (from the same series). I make it match with a very big pencil in Photoshop, using layer mask until it's look great.
I've created some colors adjustments with many layers. I only use "soft light" as fusion layers because most of the others destroy informations of the picture.

Hands pictures :
For those pictures, I've used a 105 mm f/2,8 macro lens with a remote speedlight SB 600 triggered by the main flash of the camera (color of the light : blue) and near my hands a small light (color of the light : yellow).
The speedlight SB 600 create the shadows of my fingers on my hands (it looks like the sunrise/sunset on the beach).
I've painted my hands with some white Posca (white paint) to accentuate the skin texture. The result was pretty cool but I think with a better paint it could be better, the white wasn't enough opaque.
I've made around 100 pictures with difference gestures and light and keep the best ones (good light, good focus and good gesture).
Then I've edited pictures with Lightroom and selected 3 of then that I can put in my main scene. It's important that light and shadows match with the main scene light.
Then I've trimmed every hands in Photoshop (maybe the longest work to do) and add them to my scene. I've created some shadows on the foreground hand (behind her on the ground, and in front of my arms : the shadow of the blocos)

Crows pictures :
I've trimmed every pictures and added them on my scene. The one who is flying was interesting to put near the foreground hand, as if the bird was just flown from the hand, it gives a bit of movement.
I could have put one bird on each hand, but I think it would have been not so good for composition, not enough "real" maybe.. I don't know. So I've put them together on the same hand with one of them watching at the surfer for the dramatic sense.

Surfer :
He was on the main picture and inspires the freedom, someone who loves the nature and feels free

Thread :
Finally I've created a little thread to inspire the time (over time : "au fil du temps"). He is link to the dead hand to say something like : "don't forget them"

I've edited curve, color balance and saturation of the whole scene at the end and made some final adjustments
When I resize picture, I use sometimes "sharpen" because of the pixels interpolation who make the image "smooth".

OUTCOME
For this picture, I just want to create composition with good lighting by editing lots of pictures to create a surreal scene.
Most of the time the idea and the title comes after ? In that case, it comes when I've took my hands during a long raining evening.

3 HINTS
- The rule of thirds and compositions rules (use your camera grind and read more about it).
- Imaging where the lights are coming and what happen for shadows and objects of the scene.
- Find something interesting for your foreground, your middle plan and your background (most of time background is forgotten, but in my opinion it's really important to compose with it).

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
I like make those kind of pictures because,first of all, I'm a graphic designer in my life and in my job. I've started photography to have my own sources files to create scenes and others stuff useful for graphic design.
I'm still learning photography, I really like it because lot of things are possible and it's very long and complex to create a good picture bringing together all the criteria to make it best.

Thanks !!! Great Tutorials !

for "professional" you know?

I'll edit this text according to the new requirements for the tutorial book 2013 (as written in my OE-Mail to you, Sylvain).

Peter

Ok, thank you Peter.
Do you need anything more ? (HD files, more informations, more pictures, ...)

I'll contact you via OE-Mail when I have further questions. :-)

Hi Sylvain, Im in awe of your skill in making this shot it is something I would love to accomplish sometime. When you mention "Trimming or Trimmed " what do you me.
Thank you for this excellent tutorial.

Joe

Hi Joe,

I mean using the Pen tool (P) in Photoshop to create path and delete background.
I'm not sure for the translation : "trimmed", sorry for that.