BRING TOYS TO LIFE

James Paterson shows you how to make toys appear huge by employing the forced perspective shooting technique and some editing tricks

- James Paterson

2 HOURS

Have you ever wished your favourite toys and models were life-size? In this project we’ll show you how to make them appear so, by employing a combination of shooting skills and editing tricks. One such skill is forced perspective. Used in all sorts of productions, from fun YouTube videos to big-budget Hollywood movies, forced perspective photography enables you to play with scale by combining objects of different sizes into a realistic whole. Best of all, it doesn’t require any fancy Photoshop skills, just basic items and some time to perfect the angles.

Another trick we’ll employ here is the age-old technique of ‘smoke and mirrors’. The term refers to the old magic trick of creating floating objects with mirrors while using smoke to obscure the tell-tale seams in the trick, but for our project we’ll be using a handful of baking powder to create a flurry of snow. Not only does this help to create atmosphere, it helps to distract from the details that give the game away.

An iconic toy like ours is ideal, but you could use all kinds of items. Perhaps you have a model of an old classic car or a life-like action figure that would be ideal for this effect, or maybe you have a kid’s playroom full of toys to experiment with. Whatever you choose, the technique is the same. We begin by shooting our toy on a makeshift platform, positioned to match the scene beyond. Then we move into Photoshop, where we seamlessly bring our set of images together.