MultnomahFalls - Using multiple exposures in Photoshop

Here is my work flow for this photograph
Ok, so as I mentioned above, I took several shots without moving my camera or changing the settings. My plan was to take all of the shots and load them as layers into a Photoshop file. Even though I didn't move the camera or tripod, I still ended up with each shot being a little off calibration from the next. The first thing I needed to do was align all of the images.

Now when I was starting out in Photoshop, I would have changed the opacity of each layer, leaned into my monitor and carefully moved each layer until they aligned. Don't get me wrong, this way works. However, Photoshop has a blending mode that makes the job much easier. The blending mode is called difference. By setting each layer to difference and nudging the layer up,down,left,right, you are able to quickly align each layer without losing your vision or sanity. After I had all of the layers aligned, I picked the shot that I wanted to use as the main image. The shot was moved to the top of the layer stack. This would ultimately be the shot that went to print.

Next I added an empty layer mask to each layer. My plan was to mask out the people standing on the bridge to reveal an unoccupied part of the bridge on the layers below. I slowly worked my way down each layer. Masking out people one layer at a time, the bridge started to empty. The end result leaves no hint that I was standing in a overly populated tourist attraction.

The next step is to save the file as a new Photoshop file and make final adjustments and crop in Adobe Lightroom.

http://designbyone.com/2009/07/multnomah-falls-by-kirk-fuson/

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• MultnomahFalls Photoshop
• Oregon
• Kirk Fuson
• DesignByOne
• Blending modes
• Difference

[HoutmeyersP]

Hi

Instead of using the blend mode difference...why did you not use the auto align layers option. Select all the layers and then under "Edit" choose "auto-align layers".