Ribbons of Hope Charity Gala & Ball asked me to bid on shooting the poster image and designing the poster for their annual ball. They are a breast cancer awareness and good-works organization associated with the Pensacola Breast Cancer Association. My bid was simple: “Two tickets to the dance!”

I began with a vision lent to me by my dear friend, Barb (holding the umbrella, below). She is a big fan of the works of Jack Vettriano. His signature piece is "The Singing Butler" (seen further down). I decided to emulate his work for the poster.

I photographed Barb and two other friends, David Everritt and Angela Baroco, on our gorgeous Pensacola Beach. ’Cept it was cloudy. Fortunately, I had just shot the most glorious sunset in the history of mankind, so I dropped that photo behind the dancers on the beach. Then I used a little Adobe Photoshop magic and made the whole image look like it was painted on canvas.

Scroll down to see the different photos before they were composed together.

Original photo:

Original photo:

Final image, composed with painting look:

Close up

I even made the edge of the "painting" look like it was painted over a black canvas

Jack Vettriano's "The Singing Butler"