Making an epic collage

When I moved from Liverpool to Bristol a few years ago, the first couple of weeks in my new house, I didn’t have an internet connection. I felt rather lonely, and decided to look through some images of my old friends. I grew to realise that I had an incredible amount of them.
So many, in fact, that I figured I might as well turn them into a piece of art…
I created a 7500×5000 pixel Photoshop document, and split it into a grid of 2,730 squares of 1cm each, with a small gap in between. These squares were to become the framework upon which I was going to crop the images of all my friends.
In the end, I lost track of how many photos I used, but it must have been about 200 or so. The whole job took more than 100 hours work and resulted in a 400 MB Photoshop file
I had Photobox print me a huge poster-sized photographic print of it (and by huge, I mean a whopping 20×30 inches). The poster is now hanging on the inside of my door. Whenever I let my eyes scan across the photos, I can’t help but think there’s a lot of people out there – so many people, so many friends, so many memories.
You can’t be lonely when you have a poster of that many people close to your heart on the wall!
Check out the much-higher-resolution version on Flickr, and if you fancy having a go at making your own, you can download the Photoshop grid (76kb ZIP file which expands to a 7.8mb(!) Photoshop PSD) I used to make this. Enjoy!
Do you enjoy a smattering of random photography links? Well, squire, I welcome thee to join me on Twitter - Follow @Photocritic
© Kamps Consulting Ltd. This article is licenced for use on Pixiq only. Please do not reproduce wholly or in part without a license. More info.
Get all outdoorsy with Pentax's Optio WG2 and WG2-GPS
Canon's complement of compacts
How to use a grey card
We’re All Bozos On This Bus--The Red Bus to Hell
Nikon PB4 Bellows Reborn
Worlds Fastest Camera
The New Sony NEX 7
Photojojo iPhone Telephoto Lens review — AudioCast
Photo Accessories that Fail Security Checks
My week with Q
Studio equipment buying guide for beginners
VSCO Film Studio Review
Lessons in Lighting
The russellgraves.com Photo Minute - Truck Blinds
Photographing Children in the wedding party
Cattle Country
Creative Photo Valentine Surprise
How to Use Multiple Lights for Dramatic Portraits
Making your own flash diffuser
LR4 free presets: Faded series
Using Sync for Video in Develop
A gift of flowers: unfold your senses
On Set of "Love & Robots" the Film
My Night with Ilford Galerie Gold Silk Fibre
FOTOMOTO - Why I Left











Silhouettes & Photo Contests
Cyan, not just another color
Our 26 best photo projects of 2011
Family Ties That Bind
Animal Group Portraits
A Brief History Of Light & Photography: Part 3 of 3
A Brief History Of Light & Photography: Part 2 Of 3
Lightroom Interview: Kevin Tieskoetter
Always Dream Big
Gallery: Embedded with the Territorial Army
Getty Villa Malibu — 4 Old Faces, 1 Sunken Garden — GALLERY (6 photos)
Wildlife photography for the masses
The 110 page guide to post-processing
How much should you charge for a photograph?
Santa Pictures + Marketing for your Business




































Comments
I’ve done something similar using the website tabblo.com, it turned out really nice.
Thanks for the post. Love the idea!!
Beautiful.
I Think I will give it a go.
I used the free Picassa from Google and a collage can be made in 1 minute. But but you don’t have any kind of control. So to get a nice collage you have to click ‘generete’ button like 20 times before you have a nice collage of all your images. I used 280 images for on a print 50cm x 75 cm and looks very good! (next time i only use max 200 images)
I use both Picassa and Flickr for sharing photos over the internet but i use Flickr more often than Picassa.;`’
Post new comment