This Teen’s Digital Photomanipulations Are Delightful!

Using digital photography and editing, 15-year-old Zev Hoover creates magical worlds populated by miniature people, outsized objects, and a lot of magic.

The process is fairly simple–at least on the surface. Hoover shoots his background and his subjects separately, then digitally blends them to create a fantastical scene. He tries to shoot in the same location so that the ambient lighting and colors match, but when that doesn’t work, he’ll digitally edit the photos to make one seamless image. As usual, the real skill lies in the details, and it’s Hoover’s careful approach that makes his images–somewhere between photos and paintings–successful.

Hoover has been photographing since the age of 8, and over the past seven years, he’s honed his skills. The miniature series isn’t all he does, and the rest of his work, which includes other manipulations as well as more straightforward photographs, can be found on his Flickr profile. We can’t wait to see what he’ll be doing in the next seven years!

All images Zev Hoover