Merging images

[Sheila King]

I placed one file over the other, made the top layer a mask and inverted it so that I could paint it over the background layer.  It's not covering even though I have both the layer and the brush set to 100%-- What am I doing wrong?   I opened from ACR and tried two different ways.. mergine a .jpg over the .dng.. and then also tried making sure both files were .dng and neither would work.  You can see the ghost of the person holding my light. 

 

Sorry if this has been discussed. I wasn't sure where to find it. 

 

Thanks, 

Sheila

[Samantha LaRue]

Delete your layer mask and try again. This usually happens when your black isn't 100% black and is actually a dark grey color.

[Samantha LaRue]

And if that doesn't work - how did you add your 2nd image to the file? Did you reduce the opacity of the 2nd image to position it before converting it to a smart object? 

[Sheila King]

7 hours ago, Samantha LaRue said:

Delete your layer mask and try again. This usually happens when your black isn't 100% black and is actually a dark grey color.

which black? I'm inverting the layer and painting on with a white brush? 

[Sheila King]

7 hours ago, Samantha LaRue said:

And if that doesn't work - how did you add your 2nd image to the file? Did you reduce the opacity of the 2nd image to position it before converting it to a smart object? 

I'm going into file--I tried.. place linked and place embedded.. neither works... I just switched to CC but right before I switched from cs5 it was doing the same thing.. so I know I am doing something wrong.  I didn't even realize I converted to smart object.. I think it just automatically happened. 

[Sheila King]

Not sure what I did.. it's working now