How to Combine Exposures in Photoshop
Our eyes are capable of seeing many different degrees of brightness in one scene at a time. You could say that our eyes have a "high dynamic range." Cameras, on the other hand, are not capable of rendering many different levels of brightness in the same scene. This is why taking pictures of a landscape with a bright sky will either result in the sky appearing "blown out" (solid white) or the foreground silhouetting (becoming black against a well-exposed sky). Cameras have what is called a "low dynamic range." Photographers can increase the dynamic range of their photographs by taking multiple exposures--some with the foreground properly exposed, and others with the background properly exposed--and combining them in Photoshop.
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Instructions
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Open the darker exposure (likely the one with the properly exposed sky) in Photoshop by opening the "File" menu and selecting "Open." Highlight the image file in the explorer window and click the "Open" button.
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Select the "Rectangular Marquee Tool" and right-click on the image. Choose "Select All" from the drop down menu.
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Select the "Edit" menu and and choose "Copy."
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4
Open the lighter exposure in Photoshop. This is likely the one with a blown out sky and a properly exposed foreground.
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Select the "Edit" menu and choose "Paste." This will paste the darker exposure over the top of the lighter exposure in a new layer.
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Select the "Layer" menu and choose "Add Layer Mask" and then "Reveal All." This will create a layer mask on the darker exposure's layer which will allow you to selectively remove parts of the darker layer to reveal the lighter layer underneath.
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Click on the "Paintbrush" tool. Click the drop-down box near the word "Brush" in the toolbar to change the size and hardness of your brush. Choose a fairly large brush that closely matches the size of the dark area you will be removing. The size will depend on the size and resolution of your image. Select a soft brush by moving the Hardness slider down to 0 percent. This will make the transition between the light and dark areas of your image more gradual.
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Paint over the dark areas of the photograph by clicking and dragging the cursor over the image. As you paint, the lighter areas from the layer underneath will begin to show through.
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Select a smaller brush size to paint the finer, detailed areas of the photograph. Continue painting using various brush sizes that match the size of the area you are working on until you are satisfied with the exposure combination.
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Click on the "Filter" menu and choose "Blur," then "Gaussian Blur." Enter a value of roughly "6.0" to further soften your layer mask and make the transition between the light and dark areas even more gradual.
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Tips & Warnings
When you are making multiple exposures, make sure to keep your camera's aperture the same. Aperture affects not just the brightness of the exposure, but also the depth of field. If your two exposures contain different depths of field, the blending between the two exposures will be more obvious.
