This image is based off of a poem written by John Keats. Here is the stanza that I used, 

"Why should you leave me, sweet bird! why?
You liv’d alone in the forest-tree,
Why, pretty thing! would you not live with me?
I kiss’d you oft and gave you white peas;
Why not live sweetly, as in the green trees?"

My idea for this project was to represent a dove that had passed away and is going up into heaven.

I started off trying to find pictures that best fit the description of the scenery from the poem.

I was trying to see if I could incorporate a tree pattern off of photoshop into my image but could not figure out a way to fit it in. So, I just stuck with the picture full of green trees as described in the poem. The valley in the tree picture actually helped a lot with fitting the clouds into the image. I was  searching for clouds that had more of a glow to them so it could resemble heaven. I added an additional cloud later on to fit that idea.

Here is my process of adding in/fine tuning the clouds, including the additional "glowing" cloud that was not in the previous picture.

Next I applied the dove into the image. I was struggling with getting the dove to stand out in the picture. I went back and forth with different effects and stuck with the outer glow effect. I felt like it resembled the dove going up to heaven as if it was an angel. I also applied a gray faded outline to try show a more cloudy look into the image.

I continued to mess with the dove trying to get it to stand out more by using the burn and dodge tool. I also added a shadow around the trees to add more focus towards the clouds, and express the dove leaving its home.

This is my process of adding the shadow to the trees and applying the gray and yellow outline. I used the yellowish outline as well to represent a heavenly look.

Here I'm just cleaning up a few things leftover. I was still trying to make the dove stick out more, so used the blur tool on the trees and the sharpen tool on the dove to make a contradictory texture look. I think that helped with my intentions more than the outer glow but kept the effect anyways. 

I decided to apply my own pictures instead of using the trees I found off the internet. I started off by adding a sunset into my clouds to provide more light and to make it look like the sun is rising through the clouds. Then I began mixing in my 2 tree images that I brought in. I like how these pictures kinda resemble an unlively look because it creates a contrast between heaven in earth, showing that the dove is going to a better place.

Here is where I put all my final pieces together for my finished image. In the end I lowered the opacity to the gray outline and yellow hue because it was blocking too much of the background. Overall, I like my decision to start using a lot of my own images and feel like it helped convey the meaning of the art.