Seascape Composites - In Post #546

When I teach workshops and post-processing classes, I draw a parallel between painters and landscape photographers and painters. A painter adds elements they envision on to the canvas, building up the final work. Landscape photographers can do the same. And with seascape photography, sometimes we need to use our digital tools to create a composite, blending together several captured images to create a final photograph. Why? The ocean is a fickle subject. Occasionally, the forces of the universe align and everything is captured in a single frame. When that doesn’t happen, be patient in the field, capture several images, and assemble your vision in the digital darkroom.

In this edition of In Post, watch as I combine three images of ocean waves crashing against the land to create a composite using the best parts of each photo. I use ON1 Effects in this video do to the layer blending. You can use any photo package that has layers and layer masks - the general technique is the same.

Identify the individual photos to use to build the composite.

Open the images as layers and use layer masks and a masking brush to build the composite.

Combine all the layers into a new composite layer.

Once you have built your composite layer, do your styling and further editing on the composite layer. In this photo, I needed to straighten the horizon, brush away a few blurry birds in the sky, and add some overall color and detail.