# Struggling to remove an object ...



## stevevp (May 29, 2017)

I have recently started the odd foray into Photoshop in an effort to remove more complicated items from an image. I have watched quite a few videos from the likes of Phlearn, Kost, Adobe, Morganti etc. They all make it look very easy: a quick use of eg the lasso tool followed by a content-aware fill and voilà the offending item has vanished! I have had mixed success.

In the image below I have tried a number of methods to remove the chap in the top left-hand corner. If I try the Spot Removal tool in Lightroom I end up with various shades of blue until I get close to the wall at which point the colour from the top of the wall starts to bleed in. My attempts in Photoshop are no better. Apart from finding it more difficult than the videos suggest to accurately select the figure - particularly the join with the wall, I still have the problem of the fill not accurately identifying the correct shade of blue for the sky plus the colour bleeding from the wall.

Can someone please advise the correct method to remove this chap, which Photoshop tool to select and whether there's some magic fill and/or blend mode which will only pick up the immediately surrounding sky colour.

Many thanks in advance.


----------



## clee01l (May 29, 2017)

stevevp said:


> I have recently started the odd foray into Photoshop in an effort to remove more complicated items from an image....In the image below I have tried a number of methods to remove the chap in the top left-hand corner. If I try the Spot Removal tool in Lightroom I end up with various shades of blue until I get close to the wall at which point the colour from the top of the wall starts to bleed in. My attempts in Photoshop are no better.


  Try using a combination of the Content Aware fill tool to make a gross effort of replacing the "chap" with sky.  Then follow this with the Clone tool. You may need to zoom to 500% or better to get the selection detail necessary.  It also helps to monitor the feathering parameter and using the Cut tool with a sky blue background revealed when the "chap" is excised.


----------



## Victoria Bampton (May 29, 2017)

If I was doing it, I would...

duplicate the layer
use the clone tool to do along the edge of the wall (personally I'd do it really roughly and then use a layer mask to tidy up the edge - it's quicker than being careful with the clone tool)
really rough lasso around what's left of the man
Edit > Fill > Content Aware Fill to fill in the rest
flatten


----------



## stevevp (May 29, 2017)

Many thanks to both. I tried Victoria's method which was far more successful than anything else I tried. I need to practice my "clone tooling" as it left some hard edges to the sky samples but they are not that obvious  - and tidy up that mask along the top of the wall! This was intended as a training exercise - I am finding PS extremely difficult - and I will have to keep at it! Thanks again.


----------



## Ian.B (May 30, 2017)

minute or two with the ON1 raw prefect eraser + a touch of the clone tool
it's all about practise and experience with blue skies one of the harder to do


----------



## Ian.B (May 30, 2017)

great result steve; well done 

with a bit (lots) of patience it can be done in LR -- the trick is lots of brushes and finish up with low opacity brushes to blend it all in . this could be made better with more time than the 8-10 minutes I took
the 2nd trick is keep exporting the file (PSD) back to the same folder when it gets too busy with buttons
just because the spot remover was not design for such work doesn't mean a fair job cannot be done and the blue sky does make it harder


----------



## Ian.B (May 30, 2017)

another way would be to replace the sky so you don't need to worry matching the blue hues


----------



## stevevp (May 30, 2017)

Ian.B said:


> great result steve; well done
> 
> with a bit (lots) of patience it can be done in LR -- the trick is lots of brushes and finish up with low opacity brushes to blend it all in . this could be made better with more time than the 8-10 minutes I took
> the 2nd trick is keep exporting the file (PSD) back to the same folder when it gets too busy with buttons
> just because the spot remover was not design for such work doesn't mean a fair job cannot be done and the blue sky does make it harder


Many thanks for your comments and advice Ian. What brushes would I use in LR? I tried a blue brush but it wasn't of a sufficiently high opacity to cover plus I couldn't match the sky colour. Or am I misunderstanding?


----------



## Johan Elzenga (May 30, 2017)

Actually, this is surprisingly easy if you use the Patch Tool in Photoshop, with an extra trick. Using the Polygonal Lasso, don't select just the person, but select the whole left corner or at least include a good part of the sky as well. If you narrowly select only the person, you may still see a slight color variation.



 

Select the Patch Tool, set it to Content Aware with Structure 7 and Color 7 - 10 and drag the selection to another part of the sky.



 

That's it. You may have to use the Clone Tool for some finishing touch, but as you can see I didn't even need that.


----------



## stevevp (May 30, 2017)

Wow, that's got to be the easiest option. Many thanks Johan, I will have to give that a go.


----------

