Centaur:

I've always been fascinated by fantasy creatures, especially those that are part human. Centaurs, mermaids, nagas, they all hold a fascination for me. When we were asked to hybridize ourselves with something, I instantly thought of the animal world. I chose the zebra because it's just a little more exotic than a traditional centaur, and because, quite simply, the photo worked.

This manipulation was created with over 14 layers of varying opacity. To begin, I used the clone tool to make the photo taller, as the photo edge wasn't tall enough to accommodate the human torso. I also used the clone tool to erase significant portions of the zebra's head, since it would have jutted out beyond the margins of the torso I was using. Then I placed the torso picture on a separate layer, copied it, and transformed at a moderate opacity to get the proportions right. After that, it was simply a matter of masking out the background and using the healing tool to fix imperfections in the photo scan. For the stripes on the torso, I used feathered areas copied from the body. I used masks extensively to fine tune the stripes on the back, as well as the mane. A lot of the areas were transformed, both for size adjustments and turning them to match the outline of the spine. I also added stripes to the hair, changing the layer blending style to get the stripes to look more realistic. I used a new layer of hue/saturation to modify all the layers in the piece, making them more saturated and slightly green. I also used a separate layer of levels to improve the contrast of shadows.