10 Freaky Photoshop Artworks

Photoshop gives digital artists the opportunity to create whatever they wish, from sweet and inspiring to humorous or downright creepy. The following images show the results of those days when Photoshop artists feel a bit macabre or sinister...

Above: A Photoshop artist's freaky Mona Lisa

Creepy Nazi Boy
There's something innately disturbing about an evil child, isn't there? Children are supposedly innocent, carefree and a little naive, but this kid is far from innocent, with his shaved head, mono brow, goatee and tattoo. He looks like he could be the son of Hitler.

Photoshopped Mouth-Eyed Doll
While we're on the subject of all things sweet and innocent... Dolls are meant to be so sweet that they hurt your cute tooth, yet this doll just gives me the heebie jeebies. Imagine a creepy, horror movie doll laugh coming from three little freaky mouths all at the same time. Ack.

My Girlfriend's a Robot
You thought your girlfriend was human, right? Think again - all women are emissaries of the intergalactic robot overlord, Zorg. We're here to eat your brains...

Southern Joker
"Why so serious?"

What Lies Beneath
Because inside every woman is, well, muscle, flesh and bone, right?

Horror Bush
George Bush gets a face lift, courtesy of Photoshop image manipulation.

Just Clownin' Around
Clowns are pretty freaky, even on a good day, but this Photoshop painting, by artist Anton Semenov, shows what happens when these entertainers go clown crazy.

World War Two's Auschwitz Camp
Another picture from the gallery of Anton Semenov, depicting Auschwitz concentration camp prisoners during the holocaust. The skeletal nature of the subjects, along with their blank, staring eyes, emphasizes the horror that Holocaust victims must have endured.

Mother's Little Treasure
Because Rowan Atkinson has been precious since birth. Imagine a mother's horror when he opens his mouth and instead of crying, says, "I am the devil, but you can me Toby."

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Specimens of Mythological Creatures Displayed in Japanese Museum

The Museum of Fantastic Specimens exhibits specimens of fantasy and mythological creatures. This cryptozoology museum is curated by Hajime Emoto, based in Japan.


Cryptzoology Explained

Cryptozoology can be translated from Greek to mean “the study of hidden animals”. Cryptozoology is a pseudoscience, as the animals that cryptozoologists focus on have no physical evidence according to mainstream biology. These are animals, creatures and humanoids that appear in myths, legends and fairytales.

Animals that are studied by cryptozoologists are often referred to as cryptids. Examples of cryptids are the Loch Ness Monster, Big Foot and the Chupacabra. The term can also be used for fairies, ogres, goblins and elves. The search for living specimens of creatures that are believed to be extinct, such as dinosaurs, the quagga or the dodobird, can also be classified as cryptozoology. Many scientists criticize the ’science’ of cryptozoology, as cryptozoologists rely on anecdotal information such as myths, legends and folklore.

Creatures from Mythology and Fantasy

Above: Homo Pumilis Gidoronia: Microid Female. This is a specimen of a female fairy.

Above: Homo Pumilis Gidoronia: Mocroid Male. Specimen of a male fairy.

Above: Draconis Arbuscula (Bush Dragon)

Above: Draconis Transylvania (Romanian Dragon)

Above: Evil Beast #11

Above: Evil Beast #22

Above: Scallop Crab

Above: Ira Jose

The Museum of Fantastic Specimens

The Museum of Fantastic Specimens is open 24 hours a day and can be visited here. It is a 3-story virtual museum that showcases Emoto’s imaginary taxidermy artworks. Each specimen is a papier mache sculpture; made using bamboo, paper and modelling paste. In the past, artists have created fake photographs of ’sightings’ of cryptids, but Emoto has taken the art of cryptozoology to a new level, by constructing ’specimens’ of mythological creature remains. His designs are eerily realistic, with a degree of intricate detail not found in many papier mache sculptures. From claw to tooth, these models appear to be quite real, as if Emoto has simply found them lying beneath a pile of leaves or sand. Sadly, these macabre creature cadavers aren’t real…

Or are they?


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Artworks Whose Eyes Follow You Around the Room

Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa painting is famed for having eyes that follow you around the room. The principles used in da Vinci’s paintings can also be applied to sculpture or paper-folding to create a hollow face illusion.


Hollow Face Illusions Videos:

These videos show a variety of hollow face illusions at work. As the camera operators move around the sculptures, the faces (sometimes just the eyes) turn to watch the viewer.

This sculpture is an artist’s rendition of St Francis. Though small, the bust of St Francis is an interesting piece, as no matter where you are in the room, St Francis has his eyes on you.

Even when rendered in 3D animation software, the hollow face illusion still has an essence of magic. The eye is tricked into believing that the heads are turning as the 3D model rotates.

How it Works:

Hollow face illusions are exactly what their name implies. The artist sculpts, carves or in the case of paper or origami art, folds the material to form a “hollow” face. The human eye is trained to see a face as being convex (bulging towards the viewer), that it naturally mistakes a concave face (bulging away from the viewer) as being convex. Small sculptures can be rotated horizontally and vertically to create the impression that the head displayed is turning from side to side or up and down. For large sculptures, the viewer can move around the sculpture, marveling at the supposed manner in which the face turns to follow the viewer around the room.

Above: The face on the left is convex, and the face on the right is concave. From this angle, with the light coming from above, the illusion is easily broken.

Above: Because the light source is apparent, the illusion created by this Buddha hollow face illusion is strong. The contrasting colors between “raised” and “indented” surfaces adds to the illusion.

Above: This image of Einstein appears to protruding out of the background, but is it? 

Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa

The theories used in hollow face illusions and by da Vinci for the “Mona Lisa” are similar, but not exactly the same. Instead of creating a hollow face for Mona, da Vinci used perspective, contrast, shadows and shape to create the illusion that the Mona Lisa’s eyes turn to follow the viewer around the room. Da Vinci created a sketch called Proportions of the Face, which he used as a base for the proportions of the Mona Lisa’s face. The proportions created by da Vinci are based on the same mathematical principles as hollow face illusions, and create a similar effect.

Above: Working stages of the Mona Lisa painting, showing how da Vinci incorporated his sketch, Proportions of the Face, into the final Mona Lisa masterpiece. The reason why Mona's eyes seem to follow you around the room is a combination of light and shadows in the piece and layers upon layer of paint that give the painting a slight 3-Dimensional effect.


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Sedlec Ossuary: The Gothic Church of Human Bone

Tens of thousands of human skeletons adorn the walls and ceiling of Sedlec Ossuary, a Roman Catholic chapel in a small suburb of the Czech Republic.

The Roman Catholic chapel, Sedlec Ossuary, is home to between 40,000 and 70,000 human skeletons. These skeletons have been used to decorate the church with bone chandeliers, skeletal arches and large “bells”; piles of human bones with a hollow centre.

Above: Close-up of a’ bone bell’, showing the hollow which extends through the base of each bell. These bells contain the bulk of the human remains within Sedlec Ossuary. The bells sit in each corner of the ossuary, a testament to mass human suffering.

Above: Close-up of one of the many skull and cross bones within the ossuary.

The History of Sedlec Ossuary

In 1278, Abbot Henry of the Cistercian Monastery in Sedlec was sent to Palestine, considered by the Catholic Church as the Holy Land. He returned with a small amount of soil from Golgotha, which he scattered over the soil of the abbey cemetery. Because of this pious act, the graveyard soon became a popular burial ground for central Europeans.

Above: A chalice made from human bones stands on a pedestal in Sedlec Ossuary, framed by skull and crossed bones motifs.

A gothic chapel was built on the grounds of the cemetery between 1282 and 1320. A large vault, or ossuary, was built to house the bones that were exhumed during the excavation process.

Above: A depiction of Jesus Christ on the cross is surrounded by antique bones.

In the 14th century, the black plague ravaged central Europe, leaving thousands dead. It is believed that tens of thousands of bodies found a resting place within the holy burial ground of the monastery. The chapel later suffered a massive blow after a fire burnt everything but the outer walls.

Above: It is claimed that this chandelier contains every bone in the human body and was made from several skeletons.

Construction continued for many years, with a new entrance being added and the upper chapel being rebuilt in the early 18th century.
In 1870, The Schwarzenberg family hired a woodcarver, František Rint, to organize the heaps of bones that had collected in the Sedlec ossuary. In an attempt to give the bones a sense of order, Rint created artistic, macabre creations with the bones.

Above: The Schwarzenberg family coat of arms; created by Rint to honor his commissioners.

Above: Detail of the Schwarzenberg family coat of arms.

Above: Some of Rint’s creations are inexplicable. It is said that he attempted to portray the inevitability of mortality through his work.

Above: Rint’s creativity is apparent in this creation in which he has used a cracked human bone to create the bird’s head.

Sedlec Ossuary in the 21st Century

The Church of Bone, situated an hour’s travel outside Prague in the Czech Republic, in the province of Kutna Hora, is a popular tourist attraction that is listed in many tour guides.

Above: A statue of a cherub, a Christian figure of a baby angel, sits on top of an unlikely pedestal in the church of bone.

The ossuary has been featured on “Ripley”s Believe It Or Not’, and was used as a location for the Dungeons and Dragons movie. Ewan McGregor and Charlie Boorman visited the church in their documentary, “Long Way Round”.

Click here for a 360° view of the Sedlec Ossuary.


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