After going back to look at some of the better tilt-shift photos, doing some reading, and checking out this Photoshop tutorial, I decided to try again, this time in Photoshop. I think these came out much better.
I’ve been a fan of tilt-shift photography for a while. Typically the effect is achieved through optics; specialized (and expensive) lenses make an image look like miniature models. The effect can be stunning, particularly with aerial photographs, coastal shots, and urban landscapes. Take a look at Smashing Magazine’s post on tilt-shift photography for some great examples. Keith Loutit is even creating eerie tilt-shift videos.
Unless I win the lotto I doubt I’ll ever buy a tilt-shift lens, so I was pretty pumped to find TiltShiftMaker.com, a free site that takes your uploaded photographs and turns them into tilt-shift images.
While its not the real thing, the effect is pretty neat. I made a few test images (click each for larger views):
