Dinner Time

Hi there!
An old work from 2017 and another of my attempts at matte painting. I used monsters from png stock photos and single photo background because I wanted to focus on the blending and final realistic look, more than on spending time cutting photos or other time consuming tasks. It was meant as a quick-ish study so details are also scarce.

While reviewing it to post it here I realized I am not happy with the last few steps I took while creating it, so I've made a new edit that I think fits it better.

But here's the original:

Upon reflection, I feel like the blue filter is overwhelming especially in the near buildings and trees and takes away from the realism I wanted to achieve. The ocean's foam is too bright and stands out too much, and I definitely don't like the some sort of smoke going on at the bottom before the buildings.

I tried to correct all those things and also a bit of the lighting. I like that the original colors are there now and it still doesn't look just like a plain photo. Aside of that I added a couple more effects on top of the thing, maybe a bit exaggerated when you zoom in, but look nice overall.

I did this rather fast so maybe in another couple years I'll look at this edit and think "what was I thinking" :D You never know.

Either way I've also updated the old animation with the last step being the new edit: