Creating a beautiful double-exposed portrait isn’t easy to begin with; making one on the spot in front of a crowd of fellow photographers can be even more intimidating. But that’s what Mexico-based wedding photographer Marcos Valdés did for this image, and the final result is as romantic as it is artistic.

Valdés had just taught a seminar at Tour BodaF, a wedding photography convention in Mexico, when he and two fellow instructors engaged in a hands-on shooting demonstration using real couples as models. An audience member asked if Valdés could demonstrate a double-exposure, and he was happy to oblige.

First, he conceptualized the shot. “I wanted to create a ‘love heart’ using the surrounding elements,” Valdés recalls. “I decided to use the trees as the base of the heart and then capture the heads of the couple as the top of it.”

That quick thinking, paired with his technical skill, made the shot relatively easy to pull off. “The hardest part was keeping the couple steady while trying to compose and get the right focus with my camera upside-down. Shooting the trees as the first and main frame was easy—they stay still!”

In post, Valdés added “a little bit” of sharpness and contrast in Photoshop, and then used ExposureX, “just to get that filmy feeling.”

(Captured using a Canon Mark III with an EF 35mm f/1.4 lens.)

© Marcos Valdes

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