the Final Look Behind the Scenes

The last two Behind the Scenes from Happily Ever After?

Waking Up Human

One of the last scenes in the story, and also one of the last ones to be photographed, was the morning the spell was broken and Adrian  and Lucy were human again. So that meant setting up Kassia and Adrian's bedroom set once again.  I had photographed all the earlier bedroom scenes for the story months ago, but forgot about this last one. Thankfully I always take a photo of every set, print it out, label and file it for future reference. That way it's easy to know how to recreate it.

When I had painted and dressed the Lucy cat figure two and a half years ago, I was thinking way ahead, and made her a mini version of an outfit that I had in MSD size - exact same fabrics, and the same plaid. That way I could have at least one other cat, other than Kassia and Adrian, appear in human form at the end.

Epilogue - Having Kittens

I had wanted to show what happened to Rags, the cat, since he was an integral part of the beginning of the story. I figured with him having gone to live with the Wizard and his two female cats, that his male instincts would kick in, and after spending a year with them there had to have been at least one litter of kittens. If not more.  But how to get a lot of kittens?  

I considered sculpting them, and even pulled all kinds of photos of cute kittens in all kinds of poses.  But that was going to be a LOT of work!! Then when I mentioned it to my sister, she said why not just Photoshop them in?  

​Well, I'm not that good at Photoshop.  But then I got an idea. When I received Rags, the artist also sent along a small curled up cat figure. It was small enough to be a kitten, and was painted exactly like Rags. So I had my kitten.  I would need the corner of the Wizard's study, so set it up. I didn't need the whole set, just the one small corner....

Then I posed Willie and the cats, and the ONE kitten, set up my camera on a tri-pod, then without moving the camera, I took a series of 'identical' photos, moving the kitten around...

I took six photos in all, each with the kitten in a different position.  Then it was easy to just clone the kitten and a bit of it's surroundings into the first photo. Having taken the photos this way meant all the lighting, including the shadows, on the 'kittens' would be perfect.

I impressed even myself, and then thought I'd really like a photo with different poses, so did the entire thing all over again....

Then after I cloned the kitten from each photo into the original one....I realized that I'd forgotten to put the basket in the cubby in the background.  So had to shoot one more photo with the basket in it, so I could add that as well - to both this photo and the first one.

It was a lot of work faking all of Rag's kittens, but a lot easier and faster than if I'd tried to sculpt them all. Especially for just a few photos. It was a great new photo trick I may have to use again some day!

So that brings us to the end of all the Behind the Scenes photos from Happily Ever After? To revisit them all, from Chapter One to the End, you can go to the album in Favourite Photos 2022...

Behind the Scenes in Happily Ever After?