Removing Straight Lines With Photoshop

It is very easy to remove straight lines from a photograph using Photoshop.

1. View the photograph at 200%.
2. Click on the Clone Stamp Tool. Double-click on the third brush from the left that opens a Brush Options dialog box. Set a brush diameter. A very thin line might be 4 or 5.
3. Put the cursor close to one end of the line and Option-click.
4. Click the actual end of the line.
5. Shift-click the other end of the line. The line should disappear.

© 2009 Paul Light all rights reserved

Sizing A Photograph

Here's how to make a photograph smaller for online presentation

1 Open Photoshop

2 Go to the “Image” menu

3 Choose “Image size” and a window will open named “Image Size”

4 Go to the “Document Size box

5 If the size is displayed in anything but inches, use the pull down menus to change the width and height to inches and the resolution to pixels/inch

6 All 3 of the boxes below this should be checked

7 Change the long side to 5. This will change the other dimension automatically. So if you change the width to 5, the height will change automatically

8 Change resolution to 72 and click on OK

9 Save the file as a jpg.

© 2009 Paul Light all rights reserved

Getting A Photograph Ready For Photoshop

1 Transfer photographs to the computer
2 Make a copy of the file you plan to edit
3 Open the copy file in Photoshop NOT the original
4 Change resolution to 300 dpi
Under Image menu> select Image Size> Uncheck Resample Image Box. Change resolution to 300
Click OK
5 Convert to TIFF.
6 Assign a profile
Under Edit menu>select Assign profile>from pull down menu select the paper profile>click OK
7 Convert the file to 16 bits
Go to Image menu> select Mode> set for 16 bits per channel.

© 2009 Paul Light all rights reserved

Levels

To adjust the brightness and contrast of a black and white image, or to adjust the brightness and color balance of a color image, Layer>New Adjustment Layer>Levels. "Levels" opens a complex window with several buttons and a graph. The graph is called a histogram and is showing the tonal range of the image with the shadows on the left, the midtones in the middle and the highlights on the right. The 3 little triangles running along the line below the histogram are referred to as the input sliders. The color of each one (black, gray and white) shows what part of the tonal range that each one represents. There are 3 boxes above the histogram showing the numerical representations of every tone in the image. 0 is jet black and 255 is paper white.

To the right of the input slider bar appear 3 eyedroppers. Notice once again that they are colored black, gray and white. Click on the white one which is the one on the right. When you move the cursor into the image you will notice it has changed from an arrow (or whatever else was the previous cursor shape) to an eyedropper. Click on the lightest area of significance. In other words, don't choose something like a bright white reflection off of a mirror or something similar. The image should look somewhat different after doing this and the histogram should change. Do the same with the shadows using the eye dropper on the left. For the midtones move the midtone input slider to the left to lower the contrast and to the right to increase the contrast. Ignore the midtone eye dropper. Click on the OK button to complete the procedure and then save the image.

© 2009 Paul Light all rights reserved

Clone Stamp Tool

The clone stamp tool provides a convenient way to remove flaws in a photograph, such as white spots or black spots. With enough practice even small objects or an accidentally included date stamp can be removed from the photograph. The way to use it is as follows

1 Access the Layers palette by going to the Windows menu and choosing Layers.
2 Make the Background the active layer by clicking on it. It should change color.
3 Go to the Layer menu and choose Duplicate Layer. A window will pop up titled Duplicate Layer. Click OK. The Layers palette should now show these 2 layers - Background and Background Copy with Background Copy being the active layer.
4 Go to the tool bar and click on the icon that looks like a rubber stamp. If the cursor is held over it without clicking a label will light up that says Clone Stamp Tool.
5 Hold the cursor over any part of the image area and a circle will have replaced the pointer arrow. This shows that the Clone Stamp Tool is ready to use.
6 Put the cursor over the area to be changed and adjust the size of the circle to a slightly larger size. To change the size of the circle, go to the 2 bracket keys to the right of the letter P on the keyboard. Clicking on { makes the circle smaller. Clicking on } makes the circle bigger.
7 On the top left there are several icons. The first shows the Clone Stamp and the next one to the right says Brush. The icon is a black circle. Click on the triangle to the right of the brush icon. When the window opens move the slider for Hardness to 0%. Click anywhere in the image and a message will appear saying, “Could not use the clone stamp because the area to clone has not been defined (option-click to define a source point). Click OK to remove the message.
8 Define the source point. The source point is an area to copy and paste over the area that needs to be changed. For instance, holding the circle over an adjacent area that does not have a spot can cover a white spot.
9 After being sure that the brush hardness is set to 0% and the circle size has been set to a slightly larger than the area to be edited, hold down the Option key. While holding down this key move the mouse close to the area to be edited. It is very important that none of the area to be edited is included in this circle. The cursor should no longer look like a circle. It should look like a target.
10 Click on the area to copy and release the Option key.
11 The cursor should now be a circle again. Hold the cursor over the area to be changed. Click over this area and it should change.
12 Repeat this process where needed.

© 2009 Paul Light all rights reserved

Sharpening

Sharpening should always be the last editing step.

1 Go to the filter menu and choose Sharpen
2 Select Sharpen>Unsharp Mask. Start with
Amount 200
Radius 0.3
Threshold 0
3 Change if not sharp enough or overly sharp

© 2009 Paul Light all rights reserved