How i made this digital illustration on Photoshop ? a Digital painting and matte-painting tutorial

Hi everyone,

Final digital illustration :
(photobashing, photomanipulation, matte-painting, digital illustration completed)

Why i made this digital illustration ?

This was a test-piece entry I made for my application as a comic artist for a freelance job opportunity actually. I was supposed to make a single panel/scene as a test for the comic/graphic novel script. The test piece was paid for and the writer wanted to leave the exact composition and constituents in the illustration free to be chosen by the artist. Here is the written description provided to me in its entirety :

"It’s a late winter night in Detroit, it starts out with dark water, then it starts getting lighter as a yacht/cruise goes by and we see the Ambassador Bridge and Detroit in the background. There’s a lot of scenery of the city and its life; Renaissance centre, sports, homeless people, artwork/graffiti, etc."

Vague right ? !!! well thats exactly what my thoughts were when i first read it. But i knew i was being tested, which is why i wanted to keep the seeming confusions to myself. I read it over and over again. It sounded more like a description of a video-scene

Process Gif :

This GIF should hint at the thought process and answer some of the "how"s and "why" i changed things around from the base image. So my plan here was to start off with a set image reference in mind. And here is what i wanted to achieve !! :

After looking at this image on the right. Can you believe that the image i made was not a photomanipulation of it , but rather my base photo was this one :

photobashing-image-palette :

MOODBOARD :

I can also be found on :
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