Compositing the Shot

To create the final composite for the shot, I combine the hockey chicken and the background. Below you can see that the result works but isn't really all that interesting.

Next I create a blurred oval which I place between the background and the chicken at a fraction of full opacity to give the appearance of a shadow under the chicken.

Next, I need to create a reflection of the chicken. I take a duplicate of the original chicken, flip it upside down and squash it a bit. Once this is done, The image is blurred a lot to simulate the effect of a blurry reflection.

To add further detail, I take the photograph that is blended into the background of the ice texture and make it black and white. I then play with the color levels to get a grainy texture that matches the patterns of grooves in the ice. I then use this image to Displace the blurred chicken (where areas of white in the texture appear, the pixels of the blurred chicken will move to the right and where dark areas appear, pixels will move to the left).

The effect is subtle but important.

When all of the layers are combined, the effect is convincing ice that reflects the chicken.