Content Creation Challenge - Day 10 - Theme: Being Alive - Challenge: Use a Rope or String

When I think of being alive, I think of the struggles that come with it.  Big or small, positive or negative, it's the struggle that makes life interesting.  I thought about the rope and how it can be used in so many different ways, but I like that it can be used to harness something far away and bring it closer.  Whether it's dreams, happiness or maybe just trying to hold on to the positive things, I wanted to show that struggle today.  

I wanted a more positive image - especially of myself.  I set up my little home studio and went to work with my Yongnuo flash set up on one side to mimic the sun.  I tied the rope to the flash and weighed down the stand so that when I pulled on the rope it wouldn't just pull it over.  It took some practice with my camera remote, but I was able to get a few images I liked, but then I struggled on what I would use for the backdrop. I thought about just increasing my canvas size, but I like environmental images.  I went through my archive and found an image of clouds I took when flying to Hawaii ten years ago.  Clouds have such a different look when shot from above.  I knew the image would look better if the sun was there in the clouds as I couldn't find a ground image with sky that I felt really fit.  I looked for images of the sun and didn't find one that really worked, so I took a stock image from Nasa of the sun with all the gorgeous fire detail it has and combined it with an overexposed shot from earth and then blended them together with some brushes.  I've added the PNG file to my stock folder for download since I made it from other free images.  

I hope this image gives a positive feeling about being alive.  All the struggle and effort really is worth it!