Refuge

"Refuge", a large-scale panoramic image created using imagery of mountains, forests, and animals that I photographed at Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado. All of my artwork is primarily influenced by nature and environmentalism. Through my work, my main goal is to create elaborate, photorealistic images that carry a message of conservation and sustainability. I want to give viewers a space of contemplation by depicting beautifully idealized scenes of the natural world.

This piece is by far the largest digital image I have ever created, at a size of 30,000 pixels wide. I use a complex process of digital imaging in Adobe Photoshop and this piece is actually made up more than a hundred photographs meticulously pieced together. So I spend a lot of effort building up an image, figuring out the lighting, shadows, color, and other effects to make it look realistic and seamless. Each image is carefully planned out and created as an intricately layered construction, which gives it such a hyper-real, illustrative quality.