Sydney’s Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras in Tilt-Shift

Tilt-shift miniature faking is a technique for making images of real-life lanscapes look like tiny scale models by manipulating the focus and shooting from a specific angle. Keith Loutit a master of this craft; he’s shown us beaches, harbors and a monster truck rally from the point of view of a giant child. His latest video of the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras is the most fascinating of all. The disco candyland we see here is the straight out of the religious right’s worst nightmares about where the world is heading. Watching this felt like someone crammed Dziga Vertov and Zombie Zombie into one sparkling mini-masterpiece. Enjoy! [Thanks, Kelly]


Mardi Gras from Keith Loutit.

Posted by Nadya Lev on March 13th, 2009
Filed under Events, Faboo, Film, Photography, Surreal

7 Responses to “Sydney’s Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras in Tilt-Shift”

  1. Meridian Says:
    March 13th, 2009 at 4:52 pm

    Thank you so much for posting this!
    I was there that night (it was one of the most amazing nights ever!) and it was great to relive it in crazy mini candy fashion!

  2. Bella Says:
    March 13th, 2009 at 5:43 pm

    This is just awesome :)

    Thanks for sharing!

  3. Chris L Says:
    March 13th, 2009 at 6:42 pm

    Fantastic. Even though I know that’s from photographs, I kept finding myself thinking “jeez, that must have been really hard to animate.”

  4. cappy Says:
    March 13th, 2009 at 7:10 pm

    Holy shit that must’ve took a long time to make.

    And I beg to differ — you’d be amazed at how many members of the religious right have dreams that are exactly like this, except they’re not nightmares.

  5. one little simitopian Says:
    March 14th, 2009 at 3:13 am

    I was just reading about this amazing photographic effect yesterday, so this is a particularly exciting set of images!
    I’d love to reproduce this effect- even though my humble li’l camera is undoubtedly underqualified for the task…. however, imagination and ingenuity are really the only constraints….
    Great subject matter too. Love the Dykes on Bikes pic best.

    cappy- I certainly suspect as much!

  6. Kale Kip Says:
    March 14th, 2009 at 1:48 pm

    @Simitopian: In Photoshop, a gradient layer mask + lens blur effect usually does the trick. There’s plenty of tutorials to fake a tilt shift effect.

  7. Kathline Wilde Says:
    February 4th, 2010 at 1:40 am

    http://www.kensjvprojects.com/whatdayisfattuesday/why-is-shrove-tuesday-celebrated/mardi-gras-memories