Cloud goddess -- created with overlays in Photoshop

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE! 

I decided to greet the dawning of the new year with an image depicting a common mythological figure, a sky or cloud goddess. Such a figure was part of Egyptian mythology as Hathor, Celtic mythology as Brigid, Greek mythology as the cloud nymph Nephele, and found in most other ancient religions.

Below are the images used to create the layered photo above. The two base images were that of the model and the one of the sunrise sky. The woman was the bottom layer and the sunrise was placed on top of it as a second layer. Both were used as "Normal" layer modes. I simply painted out the woman's face with a soft black brush on a layer mask. This gave me the basic structure to the final image.

Next I placed the image of the yellow swirls on top of the other two layers and changed its mode to "Soft Light". This gave me an overall warm color cast and lightened the shadows. I often use a full color layer like this to add color harmony to a photo. 

The white vignette layer and corner sun burst on the bottom right were added last. Both of these had their layer mode changed to "Hard Light". These two images are part of the soon to be released "Sunshine Overlays" set I created for MCP Actions. The sunset and yellow swirls are from a new set of overlays I am creating for them. 

Using prepared overlays greatly simplifies the work flow of a shot like this. It's a simple process of drag-and-drop followed by a layer mode change and then some tweaking to make everything harmonize.