This project is created from an actual photograph that has had a layer of geometric paths placed on top. The portrait uses the same color scheme as the original photo. This gives the end result a surprisingly realistic appearance, especially from a distance. The background is replaced with a gradient that ties the image together. The photograph was chosen because it gives a playful and fun take on a old professional portraits, one which you may see hanging in an office or hallway. These photographs rarely show the emotion of the subject, so this breaks the seriousness and adds humor.

    The first step in this process is to find a quality photo, one with high contrast and fairly good resolution. This is important because essentially one is over pixilating the image and breaking it down to the basic colors. Once the photograph is chosen, lock the photo as the background, create a new layer and begin tracing the image with the pen tool. It is important that one completes the path for each shape created so the shape can later be filled with color. Adding a stroke will also help visualize the paths. Once the entire image has been outlined, paying special detail to the face and eyes, begin to select each completed path and fill with the color inside the shape. I mostly tried to use triangles because I enjoyed the finished look but one can get as detailed as desired. Once all paths are filled with the appropriate color, a gradient can be added to the background. This will most likely show gaps and incomplete paths, however these can easily be fixed with the pen tool and creating a background behind the image, or just making a new path.

    This was a quite enjoyable project and I did learn quite a bit. I most definitely feel comfortable navigating the pen tool and creating geometric shapes that contour and combine to create complex shapes. Probably the most beneficial things I learned during this project was breaking down an image to its basic form and colors. 

All of the many paths involved.

Original Photo.