The Process
I’ve always been in love with the 1950s – the simple, yet often-dramatic ads, and the unique fashion styles. For this project, I wanted to contrast what I loved about that era by combining it with the futuristic elements of cyberpunk – a world where technology merges with people through the augmentation of human abilities. By joining the simple with the otherworldly, I was able to bring the futuristic elements that the 1950s predicted into that era. Below is a breakdown of how I went about the project.
The Research
The 1950s style back then was on point – simple and polished. I came across this image of a young Brigitte Bardot and fell in love with it instantly. When it came to the cyborg elements, I relied on various design elements out of the Cyberpunk 2022 board game as well as the Cyberpunk 2077 videogame.
Photoshop
I found a lot of inspiration while researching imagery and had several different colour palettes to choose from; however, after testing out a few different colours, I decided to stick to a darker tone. After creating the background and cropping the model, I began working on her arm. I created the wires in Illustrator then moved over to Photoshop where I then created a layer of glass that allowed you to see the various mechanical components. The challenge here was making it look as real as possible, to make it look like a natural part of the model. This meant focusing on shadowing, lighting and various reflections. There was a lot of retouching, but it came together perfectly. I’ve added a few videos going that show my process.
Final
After the design was completed I decided to throw it into After Effects to add some animation. Here I was able to animate things like the eyes, the wires, as well as some of the other modifications to her body. Overall I’m happy with the end product. By putting all of the elements together, and with the added animation, I was able to create a creepy, yet cool end product.