Unnatural Nature

Would you be surprised if I told you this beautiful nature is not really natural? Have you immediately thought of Photoshop? Don't rush to conclusions. Some people's imagination and talent go far beyond understanding.

Some of you may have seen our post about Matthew Albanese amazing works, but this one includes his best works and the making of.

DIY Paradise
Made of cotton, salt, cooked sugar, tin foil, feathers & canvas.






Icebreaker
25 pounds of sugar cooked at varying temperatures. It's basically made out of candy, salt, egg whites, corn syrup, cream of tartar, powdered sugar, blue food coloring, india ink & flour.Three days of cooking, and two weeks of building.






Everything We Ever Were
It took two months to store up enough fireplace ash to create this lunar landscape. The darker rocks are made of mixed tilegrout, flag crumpled paper and wire. The Earth is a video stilllprojected onto the wall. Inspired by the Apollo 11 mission.






Tornado is made of steel wool, cotton, ground parsley and moss.






Paprika Mars
Made out of 12 pounds paprika, cinnamon, nutmeg, chili powder and charcoal.


Breaking Point
Volcano made out of tile grout, cotton, phosphorous ink. This model volcano was illuminated from within by 6-60 watt light bulbs.






Salt Water Falls
Model made out of glass, plexiglass, tile grout, moss, twigs, salt, painted canvas & dry ice. The waterfall was created from a time exposure of falling table salt.






Fields, After the Storm
This model is simply made out of faux fur(fields), cotton (clouds) and sifted tile grout(mountains). The perspective is forced as in all of my images, and the lighting effect was created by simply shifting the white balance.








Aurora Borealis
This one was made by photographing a beam of colored light against a black curtain to achieve the edge effect. The trees were composited from life ( so far the only real life element in any of these images) The stars are simply strobe light through holes in cork board.




Waterglass Mountains
This one is a mixture of many different materials, tile grout, moss, bottle brushes (pine trees) Actual clippings from ground cover and was built on top of standard outdoor patio table (water glass). The sky is canvas painted blue. Coloring was again achieved by shifting white balance.






Planet
This was another experimental view of Mars. The materials are paprika, cinnamon and chili powder (planet) and coffee and sugar (starfield) were sifted over the floor of my studio. The planet was photographed from 12 feet in the air. Although it looked cool, I abandoned this flat method of modeling because in the end I felt it too illustrative next to all the other landscapes.


Wildfire
Diorama made from wood, moss, yellow glitter, clear garbage bags, cooked sugar, scotch-brite pot scrubbers, bottle brushes, clipping from a bush in bloom (white flowers) clear thread, sand, tile grout (coloring), wire, paper and alternating yellow, red and orange party bulbs.








The Beginning
Ground made of parsley bush clippings and moss (trees) Tile grout (mountains) & cotton for clouds in the distance. Dry ice was used for the atmospheric perspective.



Source: flickr