Turning a photo into art

For a bit of fun I created the picture below of a pelican landing on the water at dawn in Midjourney. It’s not bad but I think I can do better.

I took this photo of a pelican landing on the ocean - and I reckon it’s pretty good.

I cut out the pelican and the trail of water from the original picture. Then I painted a graduated orange background and pasted the pelican onto it. That done, I copied the pelican image, then turned it over and foreshortened it a little to create the reflection. But then I had a bit more of a think. A bird landing like that creates ripples. And as it happens, I had a picture of ripples.

I inverted the colours to make it orange-based, then added the image as a layer, where I fiddled about with the perspective and how it would fit. And this is my finished masterpiece.

It’s not a photo anymore, it’s a piece of digital art, but I like it. Apart from anything else, it adds drama to the picture, and highlights the bird.

Is that AI? Or is it just digital art? You know, a human being using a tool…