Repairing Image Elements

Let’s start our exploration of image retouching and enhancements with a discussion of cloning and some projects illustrating its effective use. Cloning in its many variations typically involves the copying and reproduction of an image element from one area of an image to another. So, when you think about it, cloning is really just another image composition or combination technique. And like any image composition technique, a successful clone depends largely upon characteristics of the edges of the cloned object or area. In nearly all circumstances, cloned objects need to have gradational edges. Gradational edges allow cloned objects or areas to blend in with their new surroundings. Sometimes the edges need to be wide and smooth, and other times narrower and more abrupt. Cloning is often performed with a brush-type tool, so you can control the edge transition of your cloned object or area by controlling the characteristics of your cloning brush.

Cloning to Cover
You can use cloning to effectively cover a portion of an image that is not necessarily damaged or blemished, but is perhaps a part you wish were not there. Here is a good example. An image called Morning Majestic. This photo was shot during a glorious early morning sunrise in Alaska. It was one of those times when the light quality would be so ephemeral that it would last for only a few minutes, at best. So the shot had to be taken while the light was right. There was no time to position the camera to eliminate all of the unwanted foreground; therefore, the image was composed focusing on the sky and mountains and their balance with the foreground. With this image, the emphasis was placed heavily on the sky.

The framing nature of the foreground trees was worth preserving. The rooftop and low-contrast snow were ignored, because this could be dealt with later in Photoshop. One of the many advantages of shooting digital is that you can focus your attention on the main components of your image without everything having to be perfect, and perhaps miss the shot. There was time to shoot only two images before the light was gone. Stalling for even a moment would have meant not capturing the image at all. Although the overall composition is good, there is too much distracting foreground imagery with the top of the building, the low-contrast and uninteresting snow, and barely visible details in the vegetation. The contrast could also be bumped up a bit. Agood way to get a head start on all of this is to apply a Levels adjustment layer. The goal is to silhouette the foreground, making it darker and removing all the distracting detail. This can be accomplished by Option/Alt+clicking and dragging the shadow slider to the right until all the shadow foreground is filled in. This is one of those circumstances when preserving detail is not the goal.

Silhouetting for Print: Losing the Detail
To make sure that the shadow portion of an image will not show any detail, simply run your cursor over the shadow areas that you’d like to silhouette. Monitor the Info palette RGB or CMYK values as you position the cursor. RGB values should be less than 12, which corresponds to CMYK values of 95%. Ink values darker than 12 (95%) will fill in when printed and make effective silhouettes.

This adjustment of course has little effect on the tonal values in the snow that were too light to be affected by the move in the shadow. Enter the cloning tool! First, in order to be able to use the clone stamp tool I recommend you activate a duplicate of the initial background layer to create an “Edit” layer (name it whatever you like), and use this to complete the remainder of this adjustment. Next, the photographer zoomed in to near the top of the snow-covered roof and configured the Clone tool to cover the roof  with the filled-in shadow values of the silhouetted foreground.