Astrophotography layering images Affinity Photo 2.5

[ClarkW]

I have two  images of IC 1396a. One is a NASA image through filters where IR is mapped to RED and one is my visual image where RED is RED, I want to lay one image over the other without merging to align stars and crop images to same size, etc. The images will not be merged. In PixInsight  I would just drag one image over the other until they matched then size and crop. Is there a way of doing this in Affinity Photo 2.5?

TIA for any information.
ClarkW

[NotMyFault]

Hi ClarkW,

unsure if i fully get what you want, assuming you want to 

1. Use two images and match them manually to same size (assuming they have same aspect ratio, but different size)
2. do mot merge layers in any way
3. in next step, crop the document (both layers)

you can open the first image and then use place command to add another image. With default blend mode normal the upper layer will cover the lower. You may reduce layer opacity to 50% to let the lower shine through. The the move tool allows to resize or adjust the upper layer to match them visually.

finally use the crop tool to crop the documents (affects all layers).

there is no automated function to match sizes of layers in Photo.