Multiple exposures - possible methods

[DavidMillier]

With today's shots I did blend in software rather than in-camera. Not with photoshop though (shudder), never did get on with that product. I used the image stacking tool in my raw convertor, darktable, using the Mean stack function. I can only stack 8 frames in-camera with my G9, using the image stack tool I can stack up to 17 frames from any camera. Not sure why 17, but it falls over with an error if I try for more.

 

[Greg7579]

Jim, I've told you before that I really like that stuff you do. You posted those several times and told me one time your server cranked all night to pull that off and you wrote the code.

It is amazing digital art. I see it a lot in galleries.

It doesn't matter what I call it.

It only matters what you call it because it is art and you are the artist.

Would I call it photography? No, but who cares?

I like it.

 

[Greg7579]

I see this stuff in galleries all the time so some people must like it.

It looks really AI-generated to me. But I guess it is a form of digital art, not photography really.

I bet it is fun to do.

But I react to this stuff like you react to Cherubs. LOL.

A matter of taste, of course.

But I consider it photography rather than digital art on the grounds that there is nothing technique-wise that isn't standard photography.

+1

The same applies to any assembly of photographs, like focus stacking and frame averaging.

naaaah... I don't agree with that. One is just photography with realistic results trying to get more realistic DOF. The other is modern digital abstract random fuzzy art. I'm not knocking it at all. But it's not what we think of as photography. It's random graphic computer-generated art. Some of it is pretty cool. I don't dislike it. I bet it's fun to do.

It is not "graphic computer-generated art." It is an image a camera generates unless it does not support multiple exposures. It is being done on film and Polaroids. How can you call direct output from a film negative "computer-generated art?"

Most landscape photographs, including many of Ansel's images, are not "realistic." The reason is post-processing, where the photograph tunes the image to something corresponding to his vision, not reality.

I'm not overly conerned either way and it doesn't matter what I call it because no one cares. But that is not photography. It's a sort of random digital art and just waiting to see what the computer sputs out.

Again, that is the same as what you can achieve with film.

No it's not, and he was not shooting with film.

How can direct print from a film negative be called digital art?

In-camera multiple exposures can create a raw file containing merged exposures. The computer is no more involved than when shooting a classic landscape.

 

[Ap0ll0n]

I'm not prepared to accept this account of what double exposure work is. It implies the computer produces the work unaided. But double exposures, whether produced in post, or in-camera require far more fine tuning of the image in post than a regular image. Here's what my image looked like after the first step of multi exposing the images:

Very interesting. How did you get from that to the original (much better, nicely edited) image?

I did similar things to what I would do to a single frame image. I brightened it, increased contrast, increased saturation, sharpened. I can't inventory each change because like most people, you tweak away to taste until it looks more like you want it to. I probably couldn't reproduce it again exactly from scratch.

--
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Very useful, thanks

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[DavidMillier]

I see this stuff in galleries all the time so some people must like it.

It looks really AI-generated to me. But I guess it is a form of digital art, not photography really.

I bet it is fun to do.

But I react to this stuff like you react to Cherubs. LOL.

A matter of taste, of course.

But I consider it photography rather than digital art on the grounds that there is nothing technique-wise that isn't standard photography.

+1

The same applies to any assembly of photographs, like focus stacking and frame averaging.

naaaah... I don't agree with that. One is just photography with realistic results trying to get more realistic DOF. The other is modern digital abstract random fuzzy art. I'm not knocking it at all. But it's not what we think of as photography. It's random graphic computer-generated art. Some of it is pretty cool. I don't dislike it. I bet it's fun to do.

It is not "graphic computer-generated art." It is an image a camera generates unless it does not support multiple exposures. It is being done on film and Polaroids. How can you call direct output from a film negative "computer-generated art?"

Most landscape photographs, including many of Ansel's images, are not "realistic." The reason is post-processing, where the photograph tunes the image to something corresponding to his vision, not reality.

I'm not overly conerned either way and it doesn't matter what I call it because no one cares.

You must care, because you went out of your way to pronounce it as non-photographic.

I didn't go out of my way. It was just another post. I don't think it's photography at all, but who cares? It's art, and I think he can sell it. I'm actually starting to kind of like it.

But that is not photography.

That is your opinion, although you have stated it in absolutist terms. It is not mine.

Every post I have ever made on DPR is just my opinion.

It's a sort of random digital art and just waiting to see what the computer sputs out.

There is no reason to be so dismissive.

I'm not being dismissive. It is really interesting art.

This is not the tuning of an image. Its pretty cool and sort of like when one of those modern artists takes vials of paint and throws it at a canvas.

More dismissiveness.

That's your opinion that I don't agree with because being dismissive was not my intent. You have asked me in the past to not interpret motive or intent in my posts. You just violated your own rule. Why the hostility Jim?

Do you think it's photography? I don't. But no one cares that I don't because it doesn't matter. I think it is digital art. Is that an insult?

I think the language you used is insulting, even if you didn't intend it to be. It seems to express your internal beliefs that multiple exposures aren't "real photography" (ie they are some lesser thing) and that they are not the creative work of the photographer but "random" and something the "computer just spurts out" or like throwing paint at a canvas. The implication is that it isn't proper work but some lesser thing.

Personally, I think the photographer/artist has no control how their work will be received and there is no point in getting worked up about whether someone hates it (or loves it for that matter). There will always be someone who hates something and someone who loves the same thing. The mere existence of love and hate doesn't say anything meaningful about the quality of the work (whatever that can possibly mean). But.... if I'd put effort into creating something, it kind of sucks when someone simply dismisses it as not relevant.

 

[DavidMillier]

Time to stop digging and apply some self awareness here.

You're backing yourself into a corner where you are committed to the line "It's not photography, Jim, it's the lesser thing called digital art. But that's Ok, because I quite like it".

I'm sure you don't mean that. It looks like photography to me, just not the regular straight photography. And you know, even documentary photography has its place...

 

[JimKasson]

What if we do chemical printing and expose multiple negatives on a single sheet of paper? Is that photography?

And then there's the stuff the Jerry Uelsmann used to do.

If it is, why can't it be done with Photoshop?

Maggie Taylor did that kind of thing with Ps.

 

[SrMi]

I see this stuff in galleries all the time so some people must like it.

It looks really AI-generated to me. But I guess it is a form of digital art, not photography really.

I bet it is fun to do.

But I react to this stuff like you react to Cherubs. LOL.

A matter of taste, of course.

But I consider it photography rather than digital art on the grounds that there is nothing technique-wise that isn't standard photography.

+1

The same applies to any assembly of photographs, like focus stacking and frame averaging.

naaaah... I don't agree with that. One is just photography with realistic results trying to get more realistic DOF. The other is modern digital abstract random fuzzy art. I'm not knocking it at all. But it's not what we think of as photography. It's random graphic computer-generated art. Some of it is pretty cool. I don't dislike it. I bet it's fun to do.

It is not "graphic computer-generated art." It is an image a camera generates unless it does not support multiple exposures. It is being done on film and Polaroids. How can you call direct output from a film negative "computer-generated art?"

Most landscape photographs, including many of Ansel's images, are not "realistic." The reason is post-processing, where the photograph tunes the image to something corresponding to his vision, not reality.

I'm not overly conerned either way and it doesn't matter what I call it because no one cares. But that is not photography. It's a sort of random digital art and just waiting to see what the computer sputs out.

Again, that is the same as what you can achieve with film.

No it's not, and he was not shooting with film.

He was not shooting with film, but the same can be accomplished with film.

Ernst Haas, Spring (1965): https://nicosmond.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/haas_spring.jpg

How can direct print from a film negative be called digital art?

In-camera multiple exposures can create a raw file containing merged exposures. The computer is no more involved than when shooting a classic landscape.

 

[SrMi]

With today's shots I did blend in software rather than in-camera. Not with photoshop though (shudder), never did get on with that product. I used the image stacking tool in my raw convertor, darktable, using the Mean stack function. I can only stack 8 frames in-camera with my G9, using the image stack tool I can stack up to 17 frames from any camera. Not sure why 17, but it falls over with an error if I try for more.

I find creating the image entirely in the camera more satisfactory than assembling it in the post. When doing it in the camera, I can see what I am accomplishing and modify the process until it matches my vision.

Sadly, the manufacturers have removed the multiple exposure functionality with raw file output. The G9 has it, but the G8 II does not. The R5 has it, but the R5 II does not. Nikon DSLRs have it, but the Z series does not.

Canon R5 and Nikon D850, still available, are probably the best bet for in-camera multiple exposure with raw output.

 

[DavidMillier]

I went out today to test whether keeping the camera still at a high shutter speed was a good approach.

I think a shutter speed high enough to avoid camera shake on the individual frames is important. But I have a feeling that moving the camera between frames to create more of a double image is good.

I also have the feeling that the outcome is more reliable if you have a clear recognisable primary subject against a fairly homogenous background.

So far, combining frames is post is proving very image count expensive. I shot 650 frames in about half an hour. It may turn out in the end that doing this in camera with a smaller number of frames and a bit more camera movement is a more sensible approach than trying to hold the camera steady and combine 45 frames.











--
2024: Awarded Royal Photographic Society LRPS Distinction
Photo of the day: https://whisperingcat.co.uk/wp/photo-of-the-day/
Website: http://www.whisperingcat.co.uk/
DPReview gallery: https://www.dpreview.com/galleries/0286305481
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/davidmillier/ (very old!)

 

[brick33308]

I've been doing this for a long time, using Ps and layer blending.

love this

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[DavidMillier]

After my experiments with stacking images in post, I decided to go back to using pixel shift on my Lumix G9 for its in-camera compositing. And I hit a curious snag. No matter how I tried, I couldn't re-create the multiple exposure effect I got before from waving the camera around during the pixel shift burst. Every attempt led to a composited frame that looked identical to the single frame. I got very frustrated indeed, trying every setting I could think of before giving up and going back to stacking in post.

Then the other day, the answer suddenly popped into my head. Motion correction! The G9 has two pixel shift modes, mode 1 and mode 2. Mode 2 includes motion compensation. Essentially, when the camera detects motion between two shots in the sequence, it replaces a patch of the image with the content from a single frame. You lose the pixel shift improvements in that patch, but it also gets rid of the motion artefacts. It's automatic and works very well. Too well, when you are trying to abuse the system to create deliberate multiple exposures. Mode 2 is detecting motion everywhere in the frame and replacing the composite with data from a single frame - across the entire frame, deleting all evidence of multiple exposure. It's remarkably effective.

The solution is to engage mode 1 which disables all motion compensation and hey presto, multiple exposure effects return. I think I prefer using the PS mode to stacking in post. It doesn't result in 50 frames for every composite image that you have to delete and it all happens in camera which means I can set it to produce 40MP jpegs rather than 80MP raws.

Here's some examples from a quick walk around the block. I've included the single image it is based on and the finalised multiexp version. I think the method provides a nice way to generate abstract images from everyday boring scenes.





















This method should work with any camera that offers pixel shift, but obviously it doesn't save you much over image stacking in post if your camera doesn't have in-camera pixel shift like Lumix.

--
2024: Awarded Royal Photographic Society LRPS Distinction
Photo of the day: https://whisperingcat.co.uk/wp/photo-of-the-day/
Website: http://www.whisperingcat.co.uk/
DPReview gallery: https://www.dpreview.com/galleries/0286305481
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/davidmillier/ (very old!)

 

[JimKasson]

Neat.



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[DavidMillier]

Neat.

Ta.

Of course, just doing multi exp isn't enough on its own, you still have to find a suitable subject and find a way to get a decent composition. There is much serendipity involved but I think the more you practise, the more you pick up a feel for what might work and what definitely won't.

A few more:

























--
2024: Awarded Royal Photographic Society LRPS Distinction
Photo of the day: https://whisperingcat.co.uk/wp/photo-of-the-day/
Website: http://www.whisperingcat.co.uk/
DPReview gallery: https://www.dpreview.com/galleries/0286305481
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/davidmillier/ (very old!)

 

[Massinissa]

Neat.

This one can be really good printed big.

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