Web Images - Editing Quilt Photos Part 2

It is time to further explore how to fix up those less then perfect quilt photos for our blog and websites. In Part 2 of 'Web Images - Editing Quilt Photos', you will be introduced  to three new editing tools: the Clone Brush, the Freehand Selection tool and the Lighten/Darken Brush. You might like to take a few minutes to re-read Part 1 as we will be using the tools introduced in that tutorial, again. After refreshing your memory, look for one of your own quilt photos that is slightly askew, with a bit of ripple causing a darker area relative to the rest of the quilt that you can work on as you follow this tutorial.

I've shown this appliqué block before in a previous posting that introduced you to my friend Jackee Thaysen. I was in a bit of rush with that posting and did a very quick editing job which was okay; however, in this tutorial I will take a few extra steps to see if I can't improve that photo.

It will help to sit back for a minute and think about what is wrong with the image and what needs to be done to correct it. Then you have an idea of the tools you will need to use and in what order they should  be used - which will save time in the long run.

Since I only want to show the block, every thing around it has to go which means using the crop tool. The block is crooked and distorted so I will also want to use the perspective correction tool. The block is also a bit dark so I might want to lighten it; however, there is another problem which I ignored before but this time will try to correct - there is a patch of sunlight on the right edge of the block. That patch of sunlight prevented me from lighting the block as much as I wanted to before, so this time I will try to take steps to correct it. 

I am going to begin by duplicating and closing the original photo - remember - never do your editing on the original!! I will then crop to get rid some of the background; however, I still want to leave a good margin around the block before I apply the perspective correction.In the photo on the left, you can see that I have done some cropping and that the Perspective Correction tool has been activated and an editiing box appears on the quilt.

I will hover the cursor over the editing box corners and when the cursor changes shape, I will left click and hold and move those corner boxes to line up with the corners of the block. You can see in the photo to the right how I have lined up the editing box so it follows the outside edges of the quilt block. When I was satisfied with the positioning, I clicked on the green 'Apply' check mark on the Tool Options palette above the workspace. Once the perspective correction was completed, I used the crop tool, again, to isolate the quilt block.

On the left is my block after correcting the perspective and cropping. The arrows are pointing at dark patches of the quilt border that have remained after cropping. Sometimes it is possible to use the Perspective Correction again on images, but I have found that doing so will often lead to additional distortion in a new direction. Now, I plan to display this block at about the same size it is now, so I can use a new tool - the Clone Brush - which will work well to cover up those two dark areas.

To find the Clone Brush, head over to the Tools toolbar on the left and it is the ninth tool down. It shares this position with the Scratch Remover and Object Remover so you may have to click on the black arrow to find it on the fly-out menu. I activated the Brush and then went to 'Presets' and clicked on the black down arrow and then clicked on the 'Reset to Default' arrow on the right of the drop down box. Moving along the Tool Options Palette to 'Shape', I clicked on the square and then set the tool size to five. Finally, I zoomed in on my block.

Moving back onto my image, I find the cursor has changed dramatically. I moved my cursor to the dark area at the bottom of the block and I did a 'right' click on the white just above the dark. When I moved onto the dark area a small cross hair image remained behind on the white. Now, what the Clone Brush does is it takes a snapshot of the area where I did the right click and when I move over to the dark area and do a left click it will paste that snapshot onto the dark area. So, I am actually covering up the dark area with snapshot of the fabric! What I will do with my block is to right click on the white along the dark edge and after each right click move down into the dark area and do a left click. If you experiment on your own with the Clone Brush, you will soon learn how it behaves and what you need to do to get the look you want. Remember, if you don't like what you see, you can also click on 'Undo' and repeat the process.

The image on the right shows my block after I have eliminated those dark areas along the two edges using the Clone Brush. At this resolution and picture size, the 'painting' with the Brush looks completely natural and no one would notice any difference.

The next thing I want to tackle is the area on the right of the block where the sun was touching the quilt. I played with a few different tools but wasn't happy with any of the results and decided to try the Clone Brush on that area, too.

The left hand image above (#1) shows the result after I used the Clone Brush to 'cover up' that area touched by the sun.  I increased and decreased my brush size depending on where I was working but all the Clone Brush fabric 'snapshots' (right clicks) were taken in the area where the red arrow is pointing. After completing this cloning, I then used used the 'Brighten and Contrast' tool (Adjust > Brighten and Contrast) setting the Brightness at 20 and the Contrast at 0 and the result in on the right (#2). The result isn't bad; however, there is still a darker area that was due to the way the quilt was originally draped over the quilting machine bars. I am going to attempt to fix that area with the help of the Freehand Selection tool.

This tool can be found on the fly-out in the third position on the Tools toolbar to the left of the workspace. After activating, I went up to Presets to ensure it was at the default settings and then moved along the Tool Options Palette and to ensure 'Freehand' appeared under 'Selection type:' and set 'Feather' to 30.

With the Freehand Selection, I am going to isolate that darker area by drawing around it. To do this, I pick a starting point and do a left click and hold and move around the dark area and when I get back to the start point I do a double left click. The result will be an area surrounded by 'marching ants' (my former instructor's term).  You can see that I chose to actually move a bit into the lighter area at the point of the red arrow. I am going to use the 'Brighten and Contrast' tool, again; however, it  will only brighten the area I selected within those marching ants. Moving a bit into the lighter area and setting the 'Feather' to 30 - will help prevent a sharp 'edge' from being created with the lightening (does this make sense?). I used the same 'Brighten and Contrast' setting as above.

This worked well; however, there are still a few darker spots near the main stem and below the leaf stem on the lower right. To correct these areas, I am going to turn to another tool (Lighten/Darken) which you will find at the top of the fly-out in the 11th tool position on the Tools Toolbar. Again, I set the tool to its default settings and then on the Tool Option Palette I set 'Size' at 80, 'Hardness' at 50 and 'Opacity' at 50. I then moved to these darker patches and left clicked a few times in each. By default, left clicking with the tool will lighten an area and right clicking will darken an area.

The image on the right shows the tool in action. When I was satisfied with the result, I then went up to the main menu and clicked on 'Selections' and then clicked on 'Select none' (Selections > Select none) to remove the marching ants.

The image below shows the original block on the left and the block on the right shows the results of my efforts.

It sounds and looks like a lot of work, but once you are familiar with these tools it becomes much easier. Trying out different settings for the tools can take some time but keeping notes on the tools will refresh your memory and make the process quicker next time you go to use them.

By way, these are the tools used to alter model's and movie star photos in the fashion magazine. The Clone Brush is much less painful and far more quicker at removing wrinkles than plastic surgery!!