Portrait of a feline lady

This is a Photoshop composite between a portrait of a Maine coon cat and a costume I photographed during my Carnival in Venice workshop. It wasn't easy. The biggest challenge were the whiskers where they can be seen in front of the fabric in the dress. I worked at 500% magnification and basically worked pixel by pixel to precisely select the whiskers. I used the pen tool in Photoshop for this. The original shot of the cat was done with flash, and while the costume was photographed in diffused light, I left in the catchlights in the eyes. I think those small highlights help rivet our attention on the beautiful green eyes.