Using Multiple Exposures to Create Abstract Photographs

Multiple exposures is not a new technique in photography. Though uncommon now in the digital era, multiple exposure is the art of double exposing film in order to create interesting and unique results. With the latest DSLRs, this tool is now found tucked away in your camera settings, and is perhaps your camera’s best kept secret.

Idaho based wedding photographer, Sara Byrne shows us how to explore this feature on the Canon 5d Mark III, however similar tutorials can be found for Nikon and Sony. Sara also gives us a few tips to really take advantage of this old tool brought back to life.

Watch the video above to see how its done in camera on the 5d Mark III, and check out some of her beautiful results below.

double-exposure-1 double-exposure-2 double-exposure-3 double-exposure-4 double-exposure-5 double-exposure-6 double-exposure-7 double-exposure-8 double-exposure-9 double-exposure-10 double-exposure-11

 

Feel free to give this technique a try, and post some of your results in the comments below.

 

[Thanks to Sara for the video. Check out her Website & Facebook Page]

Zach Sutton's picture

Zach Sutton is an award-winning and internationally published commercial and headshot photographer based out of Los Angeles, CA. His work highlights environmental portraiture, blending landscapes and scenes with portrait photography. Zach writes for various publications on the topic of photography and retouching.

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50 Comments

Great stuff!

had the ability to do this on my older pentax stuff for year's but you have to take the shots in a row and also don't get a overlay over the older shot to play with.

It's nice how canon have implemented this feature although its more like just shooting different images and blending it in post rather than rewinding the film like with the limitations I get :).

All these do is remind me of this, but with trees:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jeremyplemon/2341347799/

LOL. That is perfect!

this one is better than any of the ones up top!

Haha!!

Great work Iiro!

Will this work on a Nikon? I´m talking about takin a picture then later using it later for a bubble expoture?

Yes... "Multiple Exposures" in the menu

I know there is multiple exposures in the menu. But I can not figur out how I take a reference picture the use it later to double expose on other images I will take later. Like in the video. She takes many portraits and the later she uses them when she takes pictures of trees. Love the funktion of liveview so she can se the furst picture. I can not find this on my Nikon.

I don't think this is possible on any Nikon. :-(

Awesome! Wow!

All the more reason for me to sell my soul and get a 5D III and use the 7D as a second body..

So, basically all you have to do is to read the damn manual of the Canon 5dmkIII, be a little creative and you're all set. I hoped this 'tutorial' might bring some revelations to me and how I might do it with my Canon 7D but I since there's nothing new, I'll go back to Photoshop.

So how can we do it with a non-5Dm3???

Unfortunately, you'll need to do it in Photoshop if you're camera doesn't have an in camera feature for it.

Or you can do it with Magic Lantern

Hi, may I know how to do this with Magic Lantern? Thank you!

I'm going to have nightmares! Thanks.

This gimmicky method is nothing new. Sara learned this method by watching the "Photo Extremist" videos: http://photoextremist.com/multiple-exposure-photography-tutorial

Yikes - this is kinda nauseating!

Yes I agree, these multiple exposure portraits look cheap and gimmicky. Reminds me of the "Bodies" exhibit; it's repulsive at best.

Fuck the haters. This is rad.

rad? it's a gimmick that's been around for awhile.

Nevermind. You've convinced me. She didn't invent the technique so it sucks.

Sarcasm is great. How fitting that the hipster tool calls himself Art. I'm sure every photo he takes is original in its purest form.

can i do the same with a canon 7D????

Great job! Check out Dan Mountford's work too @ http://www.flickr.com/photos/danmountford/

Ok if you want to do it with a little more difficulty and creatively try getting it on 1 frame inside a 30sec exposure. Like this. I did a video on how its done back in 2010. Sorry for the poor video quality

http://youtu.be/oKkgYhahjA8

Why is the bubble not erect on both sides of the portrait?

Gee, I wonder where she got that idea from? P H O T O E X T R E M I S T (http://photoextremist.com/multiple-exposure-photography-tutorial) What's next light painting?

she did win the prize last year....

Holy Sh!t are you trying to frighten us?

Pretty grotesque.

A BJ would've been more interesting.

Yaaaawn....

You can at least get rid of the distracting power lines in the composition.

This inspired me to experiment with my newly aqquired 5dmk3, but for some reason, I'm not able to switch to liveview and keep the multible exposure enabled. It doesn't show the overlay of the previous taken or selected image - any ideas of why this is or how to fix it?

You can make random multiple exposures using open-licensed images on Flickr, searching by tags at http://gimmage.com

Here is a multiple exposure tutorial using the Nikon D700 written in May 2012. It happens to be in Swedish but that should not be a very big problem for Google Chrome users.

Here it is: http://www.christofferrelander.com/multiple-exposure-tutorial/

Some nudes... Hope not to offend anyone.

I have 153 Video Tutorials (but only in Italian language) here: http://www.workshopfotografico,com

a simple shot :)

Anyone who is claiming that Sara is a sham because she didn't "invent" this technique, GROW UP. She never claimed she did, and even explains that this is what happened during the film years, when someone accidentally didn't advance the film and found this effect. Did any of you invent photography? But do you take pictures that are awesome? Are they less awesome because you didn't invent the camera? ...that's what I thought.

There is nothing abstract about these images-they’re representational human portraits with landscape replacing skin tones. Abstract is deKooning, Joseph Labers, Gerhardt Richter, etc or even Lee Freelander-I would like to actually see some abstract, non-represent all abstract multiexposure in camera images.