What is this effect called and how do I achieve this with Affinity?

ryan.fitzgerald · January 6

Hi all! Looking to get into some creative photography and looking to achieve this look.

any idea what this look is called and how do I achieve this with Affinity products?

thanks for your help

GarryP · January 6

I was able to make something (sort of, but not really) similar pretty quickly with a Levels Adjustment, a Field Blur Live Filter, an Add Noise Live Filter, and a Recolour Adjustment, see attached image.

It’s not quite the same (it’s actually quite far off) what you want but I don’t really know what you are trying to achieve, in detail.

Any exact method to reproduce the effect better would depend on exactly which aspects of the effect are most important to you and what you are starting with.

If you can give us a starting image and tell us which parts of the overall effect are the ones you want to highlight then someone should be able to give you a better idea of what to do.

Ldina · January 6

Perhaps a Threshold adjustment layer for the initial effect, then painting back some tonality in selected areas on a mask with a very low opacity brush. I’m not at my computer and haven’t tried, but that’s what jumped to mind.

carl123 · January 6

Threshhold adjustment, Gaussian blur, Unsharp Mask, FX Outer Glow

Ldina · January 6

1 hour ago, Ldina said:

Perhaps a Threshold adjustment layer for the initial effect, then painting back some tonality in selected areas on a mask with a very low opacity brush. I’m not at my computer and haven’t tried, but that’s what jumped to mind.

I found the Threshold was a bit harsh in practice. It can be mediated in a number of ways, but I decided to try another approach. First, It is probably important to start with an appropriate Hi-key image with a dark background, otherwise it requires a LOT more work. I started with Carl's Ghost image.

First, I added a Channel Mixer Adjustment Layer set to Grayscale (not needed for this image, but required for a color image...if you want B&W)
I added an aggressive Curves Adjustment to keep the blacks black, but to lighten the whites and lower contrast.
Then, I added a Diffuse Glow Filter on the top.

You can add Gaussian Blur, do some additional painting on a new pixel layer or mask with a soft opacity brush, etc. It's a start. I'm sure there are plenty of ways to do this. The AfPhoto file is attached so you can look at the layers and settings. Hope this helps.