Contextualising 3D Models - Hierarchy

I am now at the point where I need to get my 3D model, find an interesting angle that I would like to work with and then export it as a 2D graphic into Adobe Photoshop in order to begin contextualising it and adding entourage.

The following is the progression of contextualising and adding entourage to my two Hierarchy 3D models:

First Contextualisation:

This is a contextualisation that I created using a previous 3D model. This is what I was referring to when I spoke about the longer I work on one of my context images, the worse it looks.  I had an idea of what I wanted to do in my head, however you can't always replicate what is in your head onto a computer, unfortunately there are limitations. One of which is having to abide by images that have a creative commons license for manipulation. This in itself limits what images I could use. Anyway, this was a good experiment, however I definitely will not be using this as my final as I feel it looks tacky. 

Second Contextualisation:

This concept is inspired by the movie Avatar directed by James Cameron, in which there are floating land masses up above the clouds. The first step in this screen-shot was to create a layer mask and cutout my model around the dog as it is in the foreground and my model is in the mid-ground.

The next step was duplicating my model and changing the scale in order to create a sense of depth in the design - obviously the smaller the object is the further away it can look.

Next I added a colour overlay onto each of my models using a pale blue tone from the sky background. This just helps to tie the colours in better as a whole. 

I then created a gradient overlay over the all of the layers to begin to change the lighting within the context image. I used an overlay blending mode with an opacity of 80%. It makes the light look more like it is coming from the top right-hand corner of the screen. 

Finally, the last step after the gradient, I applied a colour overlay over all of the layers as well. I used the same blue as the overlay on each of my models. I used the divide blending mode with 100% opacity to enhance the light in the context image and in doing so it just livens up the whole image. I have experimented with different lighting effects however it dulled the context down again after I just livened it up.