Skip to main content
Terri Stevens
Terri Stevens
Legend
January 6, 2017
Question

A Nice video showing the use of Refine Edge with the Clone Stamp tool

  • January 6, 2017
  • 2 replies
  • 795 views

If you don't know already the old Refine Edge tool is alive and well and hiding behind the Select and Mask menu, accessible by depressing shift and clicking Select and Mask.. The forum here told you this back in October, but now some of the online Photoshop gurus have finally caught up and are producing videos. I saw a useful one today from Glyn Dewis. Glyn shows how to access Refine Edge, but also demonstrates one of my favourite methods for removing pesky color fringing on hair or in this case fur. It's a method not that much talked about, but worth knowing as it's dead easy to do. It uses the clone stamp tool in the 'darken' painting mode. To be honest he could have chosen a better image as this one is rather flat, but it serves it's purpose in demonstrating the method.

For the full size video the URL is:

https://youtu.be/Rw_qSZnmAjU

      This topic has been closed for replies.

      2 replies

      Trevor.Dennis
      Community Expert
      Trevor.DennisCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      January 8, 2017

      Terri Stevens wrote:

      but now some of the online Photoshop gurus have finally caught

      The 'so called' experts are always going to be behind most of the regular posters to a forum like this unless they, at least, follow without posting, because you simply don't get the all round exposure to the broad range of techniques and issues just by using the application.  I started learning Photoshop through the old Usenet groups back in the eighties where Chris Cox was a regular.  When the web and HTML grew, I progressed to the flickr groups where I still am still Administrator or Moderator of several of most of the major flickr Photoshop groups.  But it was not till I found this forum that my learning curve went stellar, because the regulars here had the best Photoshop knowledge by far of the communities I'd frequented (although Photoshop Gurus is pretty good).  

      Terri Stevens wrote:

      It uses the clone stamp tool in the 'darken' painting mode..

      As Christophe has said, that's an old trick.  I used to demonstrate its use for removing halos from the very first nasty HDR images in workshops.  I also used a new layer which was also set to darken, and it works from the first touch down depending on the tonal value of pixels on underlying layers. 

      Terri Stevens wrote:

      To be honest he could have chosen a better image as this one is rather flat, but it serves it's purpose in demonstrating the method.

      But don't the 'experts' always use optimum images to demonstrate?  That's why I loved Martin Evening's old Refine Edge tutorial because he used a real world image with a busy background, and takes it though from producing the mask, to placing the new layer with mask in a target image, and refining the mask again. That's also very relevant to the Refine Edge work around, come to think of it.

        c.pfaffenbichler
        Community Expert
        c.pfaffenbichlerCommunity Expert
        Community Expert
        January 8, 2017

        Decontaminating the edges of clipped objects with the Clone Stamp Tool is a fairly old technique.

        But I get the impression that a detail of what the guy states in the video is not quite correct – setting the Clone Stamp Tool to Darken and stamping on a Clipping Masked Normal Layer can in fact result in lighter pixels depending on the Clone Source.

        Terri Stevens
        Terri StevensAuthor
        Legend
        January 8, 2017

        that's interesting. I thought the principle was , if you select 'darken' mode for the brush then the cloned pixels would only apply if the pixels immediately under the brush are lighter than the clone source and in that way a halo is removed. I can see it would become very messy if the transparent pixels were not locked. I guess it's a matter of being very careful with a small fairly hard brush?

        c.pfaffenbichler
        Community Expert
        c.pfaffenbichlerCommunity Expert
        Community Expert
        January 8, 2017
        I thought the principle was , if you select 'darken' mode for the brush then the cloned pixels would only apply if the pixels immediately under the brush are lighter than the clone source and in that way a halo is removed.

        Yes, but as the new Layer is empty the Clone Stamp application is always darker (or lighter, does not matter yet) – until one hits pixels one has already stamped (or otherwise created content on).

        So if you picked up some region that was lighter than the content of the base Layer it would still apply.

        Alternatively one could set the »hair«-Layer itself to Darken or one could Clone Stamp on the content-Layer (or a duplicate thereof).

        The point is pretty much academic, as long as one choses the Clone Source appropriately it will usually not stand out …

        Terms & ConditionsAccessibility statement
        Using the community Terms of use Privacy Cookie preferences Do not sell or share my personal information ad choicesAdChoices