Schrödinger's Machine

It doesn't have to be a cat.

I was in the mood to write some obscurras or maybe... just maybe... even cap.  So I went to the source I always do, fuskator, and looked through their first page.  I was surprised to not only find this set, but also a couple others that have inspired some ideas (you might get to see those ideas in the next few days as I haven't worked on them yet).

Anyway, I'm a big fan of Valentina Nappi and she drew me into this set.  There were plenty of images to work from, but I'd just be an idiot if I didn't take advantage of the huge mirror.  You all know I'm a big fan of mirrors in caps, so I only paid attention to the images where it was a focus.   At first I thought I might work with this image:

My first idea for the image was a sudden change... maybe a body swap.  I guy wants to be a beautiful model that he sees in magazines and such, and in a rush trades bodies with her as he stares at a set of her photos in Vogue... only to find out that she works REALLY hard at getting those jobs!  her expression worked, it had a mirror, it had that text to build upon... but that wasn't really using the mirror.  It just had a mirror in it.

So I kept looking.  Some of the photos with actual sex in them were good, but I spotted minor problems in each of them... a bad expression here, or a set of closed eyes there.  So I finally settled on the image that emphasized the mirror the most:

The first thing I did was to crop it in.  I wanted it a little more intimate, even before I knew what the story was.  When I got a close up on her face(s), I started to notice the subtle differences in her expression.  Sure, it's not two different expressions, but from the 'behind' angle she looks more confident, while the 'front' angle makes her look a little more worried.  Concerned.

Aha!  Two different worlds, she's just been transformed and sees the two worlds that she had a chance to be in, and doesn't know which one is real and which one is the reflection.  A world where she's forced and coerced and a world where she's free and happy.  I liked it, so I ran with it.  Only on the last pass did I realize that this was a variation of Schrodinger's Cat where the cat is both alive AND dead but end up in separate worlds.  I liked the comparison so I threw it in.

The design was.... well, I'm rusty as all hell so it wasn't the easiest design work in the world even though it's a fairly simple layout.  I had to tweak the story just a bit to get the two halves to line up right, and then it was just a matter of the title.  I know it's probably such a small detail that you didn't notice, but it's one of those subtle solutions that I just love.  You see, here's the original problem:

See how the 'm' in machine overlaps her hair.  I hated it!  I had already picked and loved the font for Schrodinger's.  I had already picked and loved the font for machine.  I wanted machine lined up with the h moving up into Schordinger's, and I had already placed Schrodinger's where I wanted.  I tried moving machine over to the right and having the h line up between the G and the E, but I didn't like it as it pushed machine over past the 's in Schrodinger's.

But that m over her hair.... grrr.  And then the simple solution hit me... why have the title on top?  Why not put it behind her head.  You'd still have enough of the m to make out that it was machine. So I rasterized the lettering and using a soft brush, just erased the part of the m that was sitting on top of her hair.   That little bit of effort effectively made it look like the m was behind her hair and gave the image even more depth (especially since it's now in the mirror world!).

I'm happy with it.  It's not a complicated story by any means nor is it a clever design... but it works and I make so few of these it's a real treat to have one come out looking good.  Of course, I'm so far out of habit, I'm not even sure if it's 'good' or not. Only you'll be able to tell me!