WHICH SIDE WOULD YOU CHOOSE? Montage

My plan for montage:
* Research of different montages
* Theme of montage
* Find all the photos for montage

After doing my research I came up with an idea that I should create a montage about how nature is destroyed with buildings, factory's etc. About how there is more rubbish than landscapes and nature.

My plan was to find a photograph with a tree in the center (photo1). Then I tried to find a photo with buildings or a factory,  I thought that the one I chose (photo2) fits perfectly, especially because of the smoke.

 Then its time for fun - Photoshop (I used Photoshop CS5).

First I opened photo 1. Then I opened photo 2 and cropped it. After cropping photo 2 I put it on photo 1. To give it a better look, not just 2 photos mixed together, I used the Eraser Tool on photo2. As well so the left side would blend better, trough Layers I used Multiply option.  I think the result worked well. 

To give more life to the nature side of the photo, I found a photo of a bird. Then using the Magnetic Lasso Tool I cropped it out. Another option is to use quick mask with the brush on 100% opacity. Using the shortcut command+c I copied and pasted 3 more birds. Using Edit-Transform-Scale I changed the size of the birds.
 To give more spirit for left (natural) side of the photo I research some photos of animals, and I thought that this rabbit was perfect for my montage. I used the Magic Wand Tool to crop it out from original photo, than put in my montage. I chose Hard Light option trough Layers and then blend it together with Eraser Tool so would look like rabbit is hiding in grass.
To show more about my main idea about how people are leaving rubbish everywhere I chose a photo with plastic bottles. I used Lasso Tool to crop them out, then used again Hard Light option trough Layers so it would blend together.
The last step was text, I came up with " What side would you choose?" (Well actually I put What side you would choose but my mate Aaron said i should swop would&you, as you have notice my English is not the best :) I applied text just using Horizontal Type Tool.
And wollaah - its done!

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PHOTO MONTAGE

There will always be an argument over who invented the word "photomontage". What is not at issue is that it was one of the members of the Berlin Dada group: the debate is about which one. This is hardly surprising since much of the early montage work was the result of collaboration, and many early works are credited to more than one artist. So the official (and diplomatic) version is that the five exponents of Dada montage, John Hearfield, Hannah Hoch, Johannes Baader, Raoul Hausman, and George Grosz all agreed that their new art form required a new name (to distinguish it from the painterly collage of the Cubists.)

Dada was always about kicking out against the status quo. After all, the status quo had just produced the most devastating war in European history, and the artists, who had mostly spent the war years in the safety of neutral Switzerland, returned to Germany desperate to find ways of conveying the madness of the age. One early Dada exhibition was held in a men's public toilet, and visitors were given an axe to destroy the exhibits: it was never a movement much concerned with commercialism or posterity!

"Montage" in German means "fitting" or "assembly line" and "monteur" means "mechanic" or "engineer". John Heartfield, the best known practitioner of montage who used to work in overalls, came to be known as Monteur Heartfield, in recognition of his attitude to the world of art. Hannah Höch, who uniquely continued to produce montages throughout her long and varied life, said: "Our whole purpose was to integrate objects from the world of machines and industry into the world of art."

Many of the earliest Dada montages were used as covers and illustrations for magazines and manifestos of the movement. Their style was usually wildly anarchic, utilising many elements, some of which inevitably included photos of the Dada artists, juxtaposed with much apparently random newspaper text. From these initial experiments, the major figures in Dada photomontage emerged with vastly different styles and agendas.

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/davepalmer/cutandpaste/dada.html

 GRETE STERN

Jerry Uelsmann

My go with photo montage