Creating a realistic photo composite in Affinity Photo with Joseph Cristina

In this Lockdown 2020 session, professional commercial photographer Joseph Cristina shows you how to produce a realistic-looking photo composite with Affinity Photo. He takes you through his process starting from a budget-friendly model session to live compositing in the app, diving into how these real-world professional productions are created and explaining why certain selections and editing decisions are made along the way.
Joseph will be available on KZbin’s Live Chat for this session’s premiere on Monday, 11 May 2020 at 4pm BST to answer any questions.
You can learn more about Joseph and his work at:
Main Website - JCristina.com
KZbin Channel - / jcristinaphoto
Twitter - / josephcristina
Instagram - / josephcristina
Facebook - / jcphotographytools
LinkedIn - / josephcristina
**Additional note: Joseph refers to his session as being part of '100 commissions, 100 days', which is not correct. We will be endeavouring to commission/license 100 pieces separate to the Lockdown 2020: Affinity creative sessions**
** Lockdown 2020: Affinity creative sessions **
Stay tuned to the official Affinity KZbin channel as every day in May at 4pm BST we will be premiering inspirational creative sessions for Lockdown 2020. The sessions will be led by top creatives who use Affinity or one of our in-house product experts and give you the chance to follow along as incredible artists, illustrators, designers and photographers work on a project using the apps.
We will be announcing the details of each daily session on our social channels, so make sure you're following us on Instagram ( / affinitybyserif , Twitter ( / affinitybyserif ) and Facebook ( / affinitybyserif ) to stay updated.
You can find out more about the Affinity suite, including getting access to free trials, over on affinity.serif.com/.

[@peterjackhandy]

Probably the best tut on compositing I've seen... yet ☺ Lots of suggestions, with excellent practical aplication, for better ways of doing what I already try to achieve.

[@mantisweb]

Thank you. That was a superb demonstration. Time to play!

[@jcristina]

Thank so much, Nigel. I truly appreciate the positive feedback! Many blessings!

[@chepo1956]

Hey Joe. Now this is the type of videos I enjoy. More tutorials please. This was informative and straight to the point.

[@uglystrawberry]

Affinity, please more videos like this one and Isabels - detailed and informative... no speed painting.

[@jcristina]

Thanks for watching, Rafael.

[@iangore7340]

I really enjoyed this! It's good to get an insight into how people think about their editing as well as the practicalities of doing it. More like this, please!

[@jcristina]

Thank so much, Ian. I very happy you enjoyed the presentation.

[@Caldecav10]

Brilliant demonstration, so clear!! I’m off to subscribe now!

[@jcristina]

Thanks so much Chris. Glad you found the content clear and helpful.

[@larsoli]

I just love this LockDown2020 Session since they show the variety of artists, their different approaches and techniques. Weather it is speed painting, detailed tutorial or more talking about the concepts, it's just very interesting. I don't think we are to expect a series of in depth tutorials, I think it's more about the artists themselves - at least that's what I enjoy about it. Cheers

[@jcristina]

I to am enjoyed what Affinity has put on here.. Lockdown 2020 is full of great ideas and creative vision. Thank you for being here and taking the time to comment, Larsoli

[@Manuelordorica880]

I love these tutorials. Thank you Joseph, and thank you Affinity.

[@jcristina]

Thank you, Manuel, for taking the time to watch and comment!

[@barbhagger6569]

Thank you, great info. These tutorials have been fantastic.

[@MauroSanna]

Hey Joseph, nice video you put together for Serif! I really enjoyed it. I have been following you since Your videos about cutting Adobe, and as soon as I have seen your name in my Affinity KZbin subscription I was like, wow, can't miss this one! Good stuff as always. Love your contents. Keep up the good work!

[@jcristina]

You're so very kind. I really appreciate the positive feedback!!!

[@dbreardon]

Enjoyed this one. I like these composite shots. One thing I will say is I don't think he need to add any masks to the adjustment layers as they act like masks anyway where you can simply paint in white to black colors to reveal or conceal. Maybe someone can correct me if I am wrong but just tried it in Affinity Photo and it seemed to work without adding a mask

[@jcristina]

Thanks so much for that.. I believe you are 100% correct. Thanks for taking the time to point that out.

[@detroitcommercialphotovide148]

Great Video! Much better than most I've seen from Affinity!

[@Valleedbrume]

Nice to see you do a demo for Affinity.Great demo!!See you on your regular channel.

[@jcristina]

I truly do love the Affinity software and look forward to its progression in the creative industry.

[@andymullen5189]

And that cutting the Cord video is what switched me on to Affinity, so thank you for that

[@jcristina]

That's very kind. I hope the switch has been the right one for you. I'm unbias with my software choices and only select the best for my use. Affinity happens to be the one for me. Thank you for taking the time to comment, Andy!

[@nitareed4088]

Me too!

[@cliveyoung6334]

Amazing tutorial and I have learnt so much from it, thank you .

[@jed1947]

Nice - I learned about using multiply blend mode.Very useful to see you using the other various features and tools.

[@TLSTORM]

Dude your amazing. I really enjoyed and learned something from this video.

[@rutheowen]

I am a beginner and found this really helpful and inspiring. Thank you.

[@galedarosa2402]

Thank you. This is what I have been looking for.

[@jcristina]

Thank you for being here!!!

[@bluenotejunkie4209]

I enjoyed that! Nice Job and Thank you!

[@glenboid]

Another top quality video from @jcristina :)

[@jcristina]

So kind! Thank you for taking the time out of your day to watch, Glen.x

[@glenboid]

@@jcristina No problem, Joseph, I enjoy your vlogs, and I learned some stuff about Affinity Photo today, so my thanks to you! :)

[@12musts54]

Amazing content!... Thanks for the e-book!

[@jcristina]

You're very welcome! I hope you enjoy it! Thanks for taking the time out of your schedule to hang out and watch the Premiere.

[@grolleronpaul5173]

Très intéressant, bien expliqué, merci.

[@anthnshaz10]

Fantastic video - thanks

[@rogerg6148]

Great tutorial ! New to Affinity, but many years with Adobe etc

[@kevtiko]

Thanks. So you develop your RAW in Canon's RAW develop tool, export it as TIFF and then import it to AF... Right? I'm interested in that same workflow, I shoot Nikon and they recently released NX Studio, which is pretty cool.

[@wcrofford]

which raw editor did you before you brought the photo into affinity photo? One of reasons I like corel after shot 3 it that I can see the whole folder from my drive/sd card

[@jcristina]

I was using Exposure X5 for this demo but also use Luminar, OnOne, Capture One, and a few others.

[@richpate9436]

I'm switching from Photoshop too, but I am concerned about the destructive editing in this video. For instance, is the touch-up on the model layer (patch tool & healing brush) destructive? Also, once you shrink the model to size, can you later go back and increase her size a bit without pixelation? Photoshop allows this when making the object a Smart Object and then you can use the Transform tool to shrink or expand the object as desired any time w/o loss of resolution. Can you do this in Affinity Photo?

[@hermancvermeulen9793]

An excellent presentation, the right fast and detail so that I could learn something from it, the others are too fast and too little detail.

[@rolandrick]

What’s that for a raw editor? That’s the one thing I am missing in Affinity software palette and the raw editor of Photo is unusable. I am using Capture One but also on V 21 it’s not supporting .afphoto natively 😥

[@apertunityphotography]

Great video and interested to see your channel to see Exposure X5 too. Could be the RAW editor to pair with Affinity, rather than Lightroom

[@jcristina]

I did a video about all the different RAW editors that I tested when I Cutt The Cord with Adobe May of 2019. Check it out in my Life After Adobe Cutting The Cord Series Playlist.

[@rickpinelli9268]

Great Demo Joseph!

[@jcristina]

Thank you Rick! Appreciate that.

[@hydroxacte]

I notice when painting to tweak the adjustment layers, your brush is 100% opacity, 36% flow. Another Affinity teacher I've been watching/reading suggested just the opposite: full flow, lower the opacity. Comment? Is there a meaningful difference in effective control?

[@jcristina]

Editing is as different from Editor to Editor and project to project. My recommendation is to simply play and enjoy the process. You will always produce better images having fun with it., David. Thanks so much for hanging out and watching my friend.

[@nitareed4088]

Great! I am such a fan...I tell ya! Started with "cutting the cord". I have never looked back. Looking at adding Designer and Publisher for the trifecta. If I could he Procreate on Android, I'd do that, but I'm going Krita (I'm just nerve doing Apple). Thanks for another away some tut! Six note: peeved that I just found out about this..

[@iankelsall25]

thankyou for pointing out the importance of matching the lighting. Often i have had to work backwards, matching the background image lighting (and resolution) with a foreground image that i already have. You can't just use any background, something friends of mine don't understand!

[@jcristina]

LOL! 110% correction... Build your image from the back to the front and you will have less work in post-production!

[@ferrilucacom]

Dall'Italia Grazie!!!

[@rickved]

You have to tell us how to "make affinity do the work" when you make it vanish. Which buttons are you pushing? We have not done this before.

[@rothkoksm3546]

Please fix the font freezing bug

[@2charlesbryant]

And thank you!

[@ijalabadaloza8697]

Now I know what the info is for ❤️

[@ijalabadaloza8697]

whats that copy flatened? can someone help?

[@yunava913]

Saludos Joseph desde la linda COSTA RICA

[@DorenSorell]

Like another commentor mentioned, one does not need to add a mask to any adjustment layer because they automatically come with a mask. But other than that, good stuff…

[@jcristina]

Thanks so much, Doren. I really appreciate you being here and taking the time to not only watch but provide feedback. Thank you.

[@DavidTheDave]

I'm here via Affinity's channel but already subscribe as Joseph Cristina is the main protagonist in the story of my jump from Adobe to Affinity. Great video. Thanks mate!

[@jcristina]

Thank so much, David and I hope you leap from Adobe has been a good one with my Life After Adobe Cutting The Cord Series!

[@incoitaly]

......you are an actor....great

[@jcristina]

;) thanks... I think.. :)

[@stevevickers2844]

Excellent

[@jcristina]

Thanks so much for being there.

[@glyendatoler2684]

What is serif movie plus

[@iangore7340]

Movie Plus is a video editor - one of Serif's legacy products.

[@alexpadillayt]

6:41 is that bridge app?

[@jcristina]

Was using Exposure X5 as a RAW editor.

[@alexpadillayt]

@@jcristina thank you (:

[@leahderek1]

Which RAW editor?

[@ErrkaPetti]

Capture One?

[@jcristina]

That was Exposure X5

[@aleale11000]

life hack. You do not need to add the mask to the adjustment layers. Just take your brush and start to paint the latter.

[@jcristina]

Thanks.

[@pcpcnow]

These are my biggest issues

[@pcpcnow]

No I am on you tube lol

[@trevorwaller9104]

Yes. I too enjoyed the channel but using the Masks like this made me wonder if you truly have switched to Affinity in the way you say. Any half-experienced user knows that live layers incorporate masks.

[@Frozen_Death_Knight]

The reason you would want it separate is to be able to easily toggle on and off the mask and possibly duplicate the mask layer in case you would need it for something else. In this case it is probably just as well to use the built in mask, but it also isn't that big of a deal to create a mask layer either.

[@markshirley01]

I ❤️ Joe's YT channel - hop over there and give him a sub.

[@mikecupil5509]

am I the only one who thinks that the composition doesn't look so great?

[@jcristina]

Nah! I'm sure there are many others. This was a quick demo with two additional shots at the end of the video. Maybe you find one of the others to your liking. Either way, I want to thank you for taking the time to add your thoughts.

[@diyimprover6887]

Personally, I thought the light matching was very good and natural, as was the work to tie the foot to the mountaintop. What I found jarring was that the model's clothing (and maybe the "forced" pose) seemed out of place to the environment, but I can understand that would be a creative choice and takes absolutely nothing away from tutorial. Possibly more dynamic if the model hadn't been centered in the shot, but I'm guessing that's a limitation based on the original shot. I've always wanted to do some blend projects inspired by the work of Jerry Uelsmann and this tutorial will be an enormous help. Appreciate the instruction!