Hi Folks,

This is my first post but have been following FM for ages. I hope I have posted in the right section. A friend of mine has kindly asked me to take some photographs for his new album in a couple of months. What he was thinking about involves a locked camera on a tripod and multiple exposures of him sitting/standing in fore/middle/background etc. When I heard this I thought it wouldn't be a problem. I've tried a few experiments in the meantime to get the technique right. However I was thinking of some actions I could use in Photoshop to speed up the editing.

My idea was to use one initial exposure with out him in it as somekind of matte. Lets say its him sitting at one end of a kitchen table and the next exposure is of him standing behind the chair he was in. Is there anyway I could make up an action where I can use the initial empty scene and subtract/extract him in the frames he is in, leaving him as a layer. I hope reading this makes sense. Basically I don't want to have to erase the background around him for every still I take. I'm using my Canon 40D and will be shooting in RAW. Any suggestions would be welcome. Sorry for a very confusing first post.

I have done several of these with lots of success. Its more commonly called Multiplicity. I suggest join Flickr and join some of the multiplicity groups and ask this question there. I don't do much with actions but as far as I know this would not work well or someone else would of already done it. I know of no way to automate this it just takes time.

Better than using the eraser is using masks. You have finer control and your not destructively changing the photos. You can also go back and add and subtract from areas if you see a mistake later in the process. There is a bit of a learning curve with this but its generally agreed on its the best way. The eraser works, and you get similar results you just dont get the bells and whistles.

Here is one of my best attempts at multiplicity type shots.

Title: My Personal Ferrari Pit Crew


You can also search here at FM for multiplicity and find more about this, I don't thinks this post is in the right location but im not sure where else it might go. Maybe in the Photo Illustration and Digital art section? or post processing

Cheers for your help. Just needed a point in the right direction.