A striking stylistic application of merging two photos in advertising is an effective way to connect two stories in an interesting way. I’ve seen this technique time and time again and what I can say about it is everyone’s approach is totally unique. This said, I never tire of seeing this in the wild. In fact, every time I see this application I like it more and more. In this tutorial the commentator takes you step by step in the process to create the photo you see above.

Here’s a bulleted summary of the video:

• Find two photos
  • Example: 1. Face in profile and 2. Nature Shot
• Filter / Camera Raw Filter
  • Exposure + 0.45
  • Highlights –100
  • Shadows +100
  • Whites +74
  • Clarity +100
• Name Face Profile layer
• Use Black & White Layer Effect
  • High Contrast Blue Filter
• hold down option/click layer effect so it only affects the layer below
• Drag in landscape file
• Apply Screen blending mode
• Position the landscape layer
• Clip the face in profile
  • quick selection tool
  • select and mask
    • refine edge and mask tool (2nd down)
    • select the hairs, etc
• put all layers in a group and apply a mask
• put a white background layer
• Select the sky
  • quick selection tool
• Nest groups to landscape
  • make another mask
• New Layer “Reveal Nature”
  • Brush Black in make the nature spot more prevalent
• mask out the areas you don’t want to see the nature of its layer
• Desaturate areas
  • New layer with Color Blending mode
  • paint black in
  • you can also enhance color as well
    • sunset with yellow, etc…
• Brush back in some of the skin tones in the Black and White Layer effect.
• Make a subtle background
  • Copy Background layer
  • 20% opacity
  • Gaussian Blur 200%

So now that you’ve gotten through the entire video and have a good idea as to how to apply this technique in your own way, try it out and leave a link in the comments! Below are a few great examples of double exposures to get the creative juices flowing. Have fun and I can’t wait to see what you come up with!

-Aa