Exposure Blending in Affinity Photo

[@Patricksstrategy]

This is a great solution to a common problem. So thanks so much for this movie. Note: I took a standard photo, maximised the sky and saved it as a new file. Next took the same standard photo and maximised it for the land and also saved it as a new file. Then blended two new photos following your advice and it worked a treat.

[@RobinWhalley]

Thanks. I’m glad it helped you.

[@richardturner81]

Robin you’re an absolute god send. And that was a really nice photo too!

[@RobinWhalley]

Thank you. Very much appreciated.

[@andrewmahon4290]

Fantastic. I purchased Affinity Photo earlier today and was going to mail you to suggest this video. Would love a video on Affinity Photo focus stacking 😃

[@RobinWhalley]

Thanks for the suggestion. I will add it to the list but it may need to wait until I can get out to take some shots.

[@nzedsurfer]

Thankyou Robin. New to Photo Affinity and trying to blend my astro photos with the landscapes. Good tips and advice.

[@RobinWhalley]

Glad it was helpful! Thank you.

[@tomaswilde5481]

Thanks for your tutorial. I already have seen your new book this morning as I downloaded to my iphone. I´ll do the same to my iPad (better, because of the size). Sincerely congratulations Robin from Bogota, Colombia.

[@RobinWhalley]

Thank you and thank you for purchasing my book. I hope you find it valuable.

[@nostaticatall]

Another great video, thanks. I picked up a copy of the book and I'm looking forward to it.

[@RobinWhalley]

Thank you. Hope you enjoy it.

[@isoria07]

@@RobinWhalley Please, what is the title of the book we are talking about here ?

[@RobinWhalley]

@@isoria07 It could be my "Essential Affinity Photo" book (now availale as Essential Affinity Photo 2" or it may be my "Affinity Photo How To" book. You can find them on my website lenscraft.co.uk or on Amazon.

[@isoria07]

@@RobinWhalley Thank you very much for your very quick response !

[@paulkirk5760]

Excellent video and easy to follow. The manual alignment will be very useful for me. Is there an auto method similar to that in photoshop to align? I’ve used the new stack and ticked the ungroup but it doesn’t seem as effective when I come to edit different layers? A video would be good. Purchased the book which looks good.

[@RobinWhalley]

The Stack method works but only if you choose one of the blending options for the stack which in this case we don't want to. I'm sure there was another method I've used in the past but I can't seem to find it now. If I come up with it I will do another video. Thanks also for purchasing the book.

[@stefanmarch]

Great videos Robin, thanks for doing these. I've ordered the paperback version of your book. To support your channel and also while I learn better from videos I'm hoping it will be a useful reference when I need a reminder.

[@RobinWhalley]

You're welcome, and thank you for the support. I hope you enjoy the book. It has much more in it than I can pack into a video.

[@JulesMoyaert_photo]

"Fan"tastic! 👍Thank you!

[@RobinWhalley]

Glad you enjoyed it. Thank you.

[@ianbrowne9304]

bugga! now I will have to go back and redo all my blended exposure files 😇 good tips Cheers

[@RobinWhalley]

Thanks. I hope this helped.

[@CultureAgent]

I'll be buying that book Robin, I wish you success with it; don't think there'll be a problem there as instruction books aren't something that Serif do, although there is the workbook. Yours however is a how to book and will be very unique in the market place.

[@RobinWhalley]

Thank you for your support. It's much appreciated.

[@dmmchugh3714]

Hello, can I not just use the 'New Stack' option (Affinity Photo 2.4)? I've used this to blend photos taken using 3 brackets. Please clarify.

[@RobinWhalley]

You can, but the results will look quite different. The Stack option blends images using an algorithm to determine which pixel to use. In the method I showed, you choose which section of the photo to display to produce the most artistic result. For example, you may decide to leave some areas dark to control how the viewer's attention moves around the image.

[@jacopo6369]

Thank you for this simple but great tutorial!

[@RobinWhalley]

You're very welcome!

[@jorghahn2903]

Hi Robin, I'm new to Affinity and pixel editors in general. The video was really of great help but I still do not understand why it was necessary to first make the pixel selection based on the red channel. Couldn't you have achieved the same effect by just brushing the darker sky into the other image without making the prior to (red) pixel selection? Thank you!

[@RobinWhalley]

I use the pixel selection for two reasons: 1. To help separate the sky from the ground which creates a better blend. 2. It improves the blending in the sky because it blends the two exposures to some degree rather than replaces one with the other.

[@jorghahn2903]

@@RobinWhalley Thank you, Robin! I see your second point but still do not understand the first one, basically because after making the pixel selection you only painted in the sky anyway, so why is it helpful to have this better separation between sky and foreground? Thank you!

[@paulwilliams4295]

Yes, I'm still struggling to understand the purpose of the selection. Great video regardless

[@julianrohloff2811]

Great Video! I love the tip with the "Channel Mask", especially the mask-outcome at 5:58 :) Thanks a lot!

[@RobinWhalley]

Glad it was helpful! Thank you.

[@davidellinsworth22]

I merge exposures all the time in Affinity, using a few different methods. Utilizing channels to effectively make a luminosity mask is a really cool idea that I hadn't thought of before. Like it! Just one question, are the pixels that are selected from the channel those that are brighter than 50% grey? Just curious how Affinity makes the selection. Also, an unrelated question... are you a friend of Steve O'Nions? I'm sure he's mentioned you in his videos. Love his channel too, which I discovered relatively recently after also beginning to shoot 35mm as well as digital. Great video Robin. Many thanks

[@RobinWhalley]

Using the channel to create a selection is a bit different to having a pixel selected or not. Think of each pixel having a value of between 0 and 100%. Where a pixel is black it isn't seelcted. Where its white it's selected. Between these two extreemes are shades of grey which create partial selections (best way I can think of describing it). It's a bit like having an Opacity value for the selection. Yes, I am friends with Steve and you sometimes see me in the background on his videos or he will mention we are out on a shoot together. We've known each other for a long time and probably being doing monthly trips for over 10 years. He's a great photographer and his channel is excellent.

[@davidellinsworth22]

@@RobinWhalley Yes that does make sense. Very handy to know

[@paulmarbach6447]

Hi Robin, your book worth the money. Enjoying.

[@RobinWhalley]

Excellent. Thank you very much.

[@rogerfx1307]

Hi Robin, definitely an interesting use of layers for blending. But one question, can this same be done more easily using New HDR Merge functionality in AFPhoto? or it is not as good?

[@RobinWhalley]

In my opinion it isn't as good. I've only played around with HDR merge a bit but I couldn't create anything realistic.

[@mr.joeblack3831]

Thank you!

[@RobinWhalley]

You're welcome.

[@MrToadstool]

Hi robin, I’m trying to do this exact method of blending (using the channels panel with bracketed exposures) but with luminosity. I’ve watched your luminosity tutorial but that’s using a single image, I’m trying to paint in other bracketed photos like this tutorial, just using luminosity masks. Is there any way you could make a video like this or privately mentor me?

[@RobinWhalley]

The approach to painting is the same as in this video. All you need to do is generate your Luminosity mask to use. Unfortunately that isn't all that easy in Affinity Photo. If you are able to follow my other video, try that approach but just using one of the images in your bracketed exposures. An alternative is to use a combination of Blending Ranges to blend the different exposures together. You can then add layer masks to your layers and paint on those to select where the blended layer is visible.

[@MrToadstool]

@@RobinWhalley Thank you for your help. I think I just had to drag my darker layer onto of my brighter one > right click on my red channel > select load pixel selection > hit the mask button and then refine everything from there

[@EmilFinnas94]

When I try to paint on the white to reveal the darker exposure nothing hsppens. What could the reason for this be?

[@RobinWhalley]

To reveal the darker layer, the mask should be black and you should be painting onto it using white. If the mask is already white then that's why nothing happens. Have you seen this video I published a few days ago (kzbin.info/www/bejne/gnbagIx3lK6teLM). It uses the same technique and might help you.

[@abacab1701]

Very helpful video. Thanks

[@RobinWhalley]

You're welcome. Thank you.

[@jkeiffer]

New subscriber. Great video. I'm considering buying AP now.

[@RobinWhalley]

Thanks. Affinity Photo is a great replacement for Photoshop although it doesn't have any support for external maskign panels (currently) like TK Actions. But if you can live with that the price is great.

[@ptst19]

Hi Robin, i do like watching your videos and i enjoyed reading your book but i admit i am left with some doubts after watching this particular video. For me this is a skillful but simple sky replacement. There was no blending of any exposure used, just one picture was used to replace the sky in another one. This is probably purerly semantics issues, you ned to forgive my lack of English knowledge. For me blending in a pixel editing software is using an algorithm to blend (mixe) pixel values. When pixels from one picture are masked out, as in your video, there is no pixel blending, no new pixel value is cteated of two pixels from two different images. What is your opinion?

[@RobinWhalley]

To me, the process of blending images of the same scene at different exposures, whether done manually or automatically, is exposure blending. Yes, in this video I've replaced the sky but with an image of the same scene, shot at the same time, just using a different exposure. I could have achieved the same result by starting with the sky and then painting in a lighter exposure of the ground. Would that then be a ground replacement rather than a sky replacement? This technique has been around for a long time. I remember using it in Photoshop in the early 2000's (before HDR or Luminosity Masking took off) and it was always called exposure blending back then. And by HDR, I'm referring to any blending of different exposures that's done automatically by a computer algorithm. In my method, you also need to remember that you can’t see the detail of the selection. If you were to see it fully magnified you would see there are selected pixels across the entre frame, it’s just the bulk are in the sky and on the lake. I’ve chosen not to use those areas by restricting where I paint with the brush. I hope this clarifies my thinking and the reason I call it exposure blending.

[@ptst19]

@@RobinWhalley exposure bracketing is the term you mean when referring to hdr. Yep... You might be right, i could not necessarily correctly associate the blending term with the blending modes concept.

[@RobinWhalley]

@@ptst19 No, exposure bracketing to me is the process of capturing the same image but at different exposures. Blending the resulting exposures together is exposure blending. As for Blend Modes, that's applying a mathematical calculation to one layer in an image to determine which of the pixels (that layer or the lower layers) is displayed and how that pixel is adjusted. I think of that as being something separate from HDR. Sorry, I'm probably getting a bit nerdy. I have a background in software and systems development. I much prefer being a photographer.

[@fandangofandango2022]

Dear Sir, Thank You.

[@RobinWhalley]

You are most welcome

[@allanmarshall4582]

Are they two images shot, of same secene

[@RobinWhalley]

Yes. Two RAW files at differet exposures of the same scene.

[@cyrilcalmes4208]

excellent !.

[@RobinWhalley]

Many thanks!

[@ianyorke2617]

Hi Robin, Sorted now, Thanks.

[@RobinWhalley]

Great!

[@job9902]

Thanks for this!

[@RobinWhalley]

My pleasure!

[@extremelydave]

Another winner. As I look at this, there are 171 likes and ZERO thumbs down. You must be doing SOMETHING right, eh?!

[@RobinWhalley]

Thank you.