Cleaning a white brick facade

Question

Hi,I have a client that has asked me to photograph this white building and now wants the black stains on the top to be cleaned. I have already improved it with masks in lightroom and the clone stamp tool in photoshop. But I'm not sure I can make that look clean without leaving it blurry and patchy. Is there a reasonable way of achievingthis? Or does it sound like a bit too much?

davescm · Answer

Try frequency separation to separate the low frequencies (colours and shading) from the high frequencies.

To do that :

Add 2 new duplicate layers .

Name the lower duplicate Low Frequency and the upper duplicate High Frequency

Select the Low Frequency layer and use Filter Gaussian Blur (around 6.0px should work)

Select the High Frequency Layer

Go to Image > Apply Image

Set Layer to Low Frequency

Set Blending to Subtract

Set Scale to 2

Set Offset to 128

Click OK

Set the Blending mode of the High Frequency layer to Linear Light

Correct fine detail on the high frequency layer

Correct colours and shades on the low frequency layer

I've not overcleaned this example just lightened it a bit:

(Note for 16 bit images the apply image settings are slightly different :

Check Invert

Use Blending Add

Scale 2

Offset 0)

Dave

Sign up

To post, reply, or follow discussions, please sign in with your Adobe ID.

Sign in to Adobe Community

To post, reply, or follow discussions, please sign in with your Adobe ID.

Scanning file for viruses.

This file cannot be downloaded