P: (Technology Preview) Reflection Removal (CR)

[Rikk Flohr: Photography]

This post applies to Adobe Camera Raw plug-in.  

Adobe Camera Raw team is sharing an early look of our new Reflection Removal feature, which removes reflections caused by plate glass surfaces from photos. 

Note: 

• The feature currently only works on raw photos. Support for non-raw photos (e.g., JPEGs or HEICs) will be added in a future update. 

• There is a known issue on some Windows machines where the feature may produce a corrupt image. We are working on a fix for the upcoming release. 

Check out the HelpX for more detailed usage information. For more technical information on the underlying technology, please refer to this Blog post. 

Getting started with the Reflection Removal feature: 

• Make sure you have the “New AI Features and Settings Panel” Technology Preview enabled in the Camera Raw plug-in Preferences dialog (requires restarting the host application to activate). 

• Go to the Remove panel [B] , and in the “Distraction Removal” section, click on the “Reflections” checkbox. 

• Optionally adjust the slider after the ML model is done computing. 

• Use the rest of the Camera Raw tools just like you would otherwise. 

When using the slider, the key values to note are: 

• 0 – the input photo

• 100 – de-reflected (window reflections removed) photo 

• -100 – reflection photo (what the window was reflecting towards the camera) 

Please try the feature and share feedback in this community forum. It would help to include details like how you access Camera Raw (via Adobe Bridge or Photoshop), your computer system details, and as much information about what you like or do not like about the resulting photo quality. Our team will continually monitor this thread to track issues to improve the future experience. 

When to use Reflection Removal

The feature is designed to deal with large-area reflections when shooting through windows. Many other types of reflections occur in nature and are captured in photographs, but this feature may not recognize and handle those. We plan to work on expanding the supported reflection types in the future. 

Example use-cases for the feature include: 

• Looking through windows inside-out (e.g., from the car, airplane, room windows, etc.) 

• Looking through windows outside-in (e.g., shop windows) 

• Museums (e.g., paintings behind glass, glass case exhibits, etc.) 

How best to use Reflection Removal

For best results, try the new feature following these suggestions: 

• Apply Reflection Removal before applying any other edits to the photo, except for Enhance features such as Denoise
  • The changes made to the photo may be quite profound and render any changes you already made inappropriate.
  • If you plan to use both Enhance (Denoise, Super Resolution, or Raw Details) and Reflection Removal on a photo, it is better to apply Enhance first.
• Play with the feature slider and adjust the removal strength as appropriate.
• If you applied Adobe Adaptive (beta) profile prior to running the Reflection Removal feature, please update it or you may see traces of removed reflections still present in the photo (Adobe Camera Raw will remind you to do this).

Boris Ajdin: Product Manager, Emerging Products Group 

Update (01-16-2025)

To improve the performance and results of this feature, it is important that examples of images that are failing to properly remove the reflections are forwarded to the team via your report.  A large variety of file formats are allowed as attachments in these forum posts. The best option is to attach your image's raw file directly to your feedback post. Note that there is a 50 MB limit on an attachment's file size. If your raw file is too large to attach, the best option is to share the file via a file-sharing service (Dropbox or similar) and then share the link in your feedback post. Thank you for continuing to provide feedback on this Tech Preview!

If you have already shared your raw file with us - thank you!

~Rikk

Posted by:

[Eric29489323q7t4]

We have released this as a tech preview and are working to improve it in many ways, including this. Thanks for providing examples. If you're comfortable sharing the RAW files, that would be much appreciated.

[ThomasNNPS]

2T3A5664.DNG
<>
Hope that this helps and works as its a large file.

Tom

[Andreu327355457pzd]

[willemientje]

I tried it today, am using Olympus / OM digital ORF files, but the checkbox Reflections is greyed out? Does is not work .ORF files yet they are raw files too??

[KasiaD]

Issue - referring to "There is a known issue on some Windows machines" in original post!
On my Windows 10 computer I tested this tool on over a dozen NEF files dating from 2006 to 2025. As I reported below, the results were good to very good. I didn't have technical difficulties. My workflow was exporting NEF to PS which opened a nef-file copy in CR. I also successfully used the workflow recommended in this thread i.e. from LR - edit in - open as Smart Object in PS
This week I upgraded to a completely new computer with Windows 11 and I reinstalled my Adobe LR, PS and CR with the same preferences and settings in all 3 tools as previously. I now get corrupt files every time.
I have tried my old workflow and the one recommended in this thread, but in both cases I get a corrupt image.  I've tested the same NEF images on both computers today and have no issues on the old Windows 10 PC but always get a corrupt image in the new PC setup.
Please let me know if I can share more setup details to help you resolve this overall. For now I will boot up my old pc to use this very useful tool.

[rogeriorondon]

 

[Michael241586546hf7]

Exactly the same results that I get, whichever way I open a Raw file (I've tried from PS, LR and as a smart object). 

[colmanc45976152]

L'outil supprésion des reflets se passe très mal avec mes fichiers RAW

Quand Adobe corrigera ce défaut ?

Ci-joint tous les fichiers joints pour que Adobe résoud le problème

[ThomasNNPS]

Hi I changed the preferences as detailed. The photo is a dng. It was opened in photoshop from lightroom all updated. But on choosing open in camera raw filter in photoshop it says I have the wrong location.  I have norton but vpn is disabled.  I have restated both programmes to no effect.

[photo2703]

Bonjour, quand je transfert une photo de Lightroom classic vers PSD, la fonction Suppressios des reflets n'est pas disponible dans Camera Raw. Si j'ouvre la photo directement dans PSD, là ça va ??

[colmanc45976152]

photo2703 bonjour

NON non, non, pour utiliser l'outil Suppression des reflets il faut un fichier RAW ou DNG puis ouvrir dans Camera RAW..
Mais avec mon FujiFilm GFX S II ça ne marche pas. J'attends avec impatience que Adobe répart ce problème.

[This is Just Me]

I've tried using the Refleciton Removal on CR3 files and the check box is grayed out on mine, saying that it's not compatible with that file type.  Everything else seems to work on CR3 files.

Thanks

[colmanc45976152]

Vivement une nouvelle mise à jour de Adobe Bridge 2025 pour corriger le Bug de l'application "supprimer les reflets" 

[andiepar@gmail.com]

I tried what one community member posted. The idea was: it won’t work if
you get your raw photo in from LightRoom so open it in through PhotoShop
and choose it from where it’s stored, not LightRoom.. That works. Good luck.

[Eric29489323q7t4]

In Lightroom you must "open as a smart object in photoshop" and then double-click the layer to open Adobe Camera RAW. This solution is variously reported in other posts here.

[ThomasNNPS]

Thanks that did work.

[ThomasNNPS]

I tried that bringing it into bridge as demonstrated on you tube. But I
will try your idea. Thanks.

[Conrad_C]

It’s important to understand why some ways work and why others don’t. The ways that work all have one thing in common: They preserve the raw data all the way into Camera Raw, which is required for this feature (and others like Denoise). The methods that preserve raw include:

• Open straight into Photoshop (File > Open, or drag and drop), which opens the raw file into Camera Raw. 
• Open from Bridge (File > Open in Camera Raw), which opens the raw file into Camera Raw.  
• From Lightroom Classic, choose the command Photo > Edit In > Open as Smart Object in Photoshop, which preserves the raw file as a camera raw Smart Object layer. To edit it, double-click the raw Smart Object (this is a shortcut for the command Layer > Smart Objects > Edit Contents).

The following way doesn’t work because it converts the file out of raw before Photoshop receives it:

From Lightroom Classic, choose the command Photo > Edit In > Adobe Photoshop. 

Also, any method involving the Photoshop command Filter > Camera Raw Filter will not work because the filter version of Camera Raw is limited and doesn’t actually operate on the original raw data. You have to use the full Camera Raw processor on an actual raw file.

[colmanc45976152]

Conrad.. C bonjour

Toutes vos explications, pourquoi ça fonctionne, pourquoi ça ne fonctionne pas, sont parfaitement exactes. Mais vous oubliez quelque chose de très important, CA NE FONCTIONNE PAS SUR TOUS LES APPAREILS PHOTOGRAPHIQUES. Par exemple, sur mon Fujifilm GFX S II ça ne fonctionne pas.

J'attends avec impatience que Adobe corrige Adobe Bridge 2025

[Conrad_C]

Bonjour! Yes, there seem to be some raw files that reflection removal still doesn’t work with, even after opening it correctly. The failure of those files is one reason why Adobe released this feature as a Technology Preview, so they can find out and address those cases before they declare reflection removal to be final and add it to the Lightroom apps as well. It is definitely helpful to report the file types that don’t work.

My point in describing the best ways to open raw files into Camera Raw is so we can see more clearly whether the reason a file is not working because of a format incompatibility, and eliminate the possibility that it wasn’t just a workflow problem.

[Eric29489323q7t4]

If there are RAW files that you believe are not working, please share them here. I would like to know. Make sure to confirm that you can download the RAW from your own post---many users post raws but actually I have not been able to download from their post. 

[colmanc45976152]

Un fichier RAW est beaucoup trop lourd pour le faire partager dans un message. Par exemple pour moi, une image RAW originale pèse 102MP

[Eric29489323q7t4]

Another user used wetransfer.com to share a large RAW file. I hope you will consider sharing, because (so far) none of the reports that certian RAW formats do not work have been true. You would be the first person, to my knowledge, to show that there is indeed a RAW format that we cannot handle. After all, this is ACR which already works on all RAW files. If you feel certain that this RAW file has some issue, I hope you will help us find the problem by sharing the RAW file so we can test it and identify the cause of any issue.

[colmanc45976152]

Eric bonjour

J'ai suivi vos conseils, mais Wetransfer.com me demande votre adresse Mail sans quoi je ne peux vous envoyer mon fichier RAW

(Voir capture d'écran)

[Eric29489323q7t4]

You can click on the three dots (...) in the lower left to create a link that you can share.