Composite Project - Exploding Orange

People often ask me how I made this image:

So I thought that I would break it down it to the several parts which make up the final image.  The inspiration for the image came from a photo I saw a while ago with a water splash coming out of a cup, I then worked around the splash idea.  Without knowing what I was doing it took a long time to complete this project, as I kept noticing small mistakes, mainly the reflections.  So, there are four parts to this image; the splash, the main orange, the small top piece of orange and the orange with the knife in.  The background is then comprised of 2 strips (shown in the bottom image).

Splash

Main Orange

Top Piece

Knife

Background

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There are a few faults in the image, I'm not sure whether you can notice these but I have, after quite a while of looking at it I have.  One way to make the image look more 'realistic' you need to take care with the lighting.  I closed all the blind in my kitchen, turned the lights off from the rooms surrounding and had one line of lights directly above the scene.  I then placed two flashes either side and slightly above.  My mistake here was not using umbrellas instead of bare flashes.  

A lot of the time I get stuck for ideas and realise that I haven't taken any images in a while.  If you find yourself in this position then feel free to take my photo as a basis for your own image project.  It is not wrong to get ideas from others, however do not directly copy the work - and if you do then do not release it, keep the project as a personal piece.  

Like, share and feel free to leave a comment with any questions.  Thanks for reading.