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 

Posted by:

[Marty_Bigos8577]

David -

I struggled with no success of getting Sony .ARW files from LrC to PS to remove reflections. I wasreduced to exporting from LrC, opening and editing in PS, saving the fixed file on my disc, then importing back into LrC.

Your step of double clicking the layer made it all work for me as well..  Thanks for posting to help all us PS beginners.

Marty

[NicoleYM]

I haven't had any luck with removing reflections. Here's one photo that I thought would be a good candidate for the tool, but there was almost no change in the image after reflection removal. I've tried about 10 Nikon NEF files and a few Apple ProRaw photos and have had similar unimpressive results.

[Eric29489323q7t4]

Hi Nicole, this photo is not a good candidate for two reasons. First, you can't see anything behind the reflection. Reflection removal will remove reflections that are semi-transparent; but, if the reflection looks opaque so as to prevent you from seeing anything underneath it, the tool will likely do nothing. 

The second reason is that the glass is not blocking your view of the subject (the reflection area is on the smaller side). Yes, your application is reasonable, and we would like to support it in the future, but the tool is currently designed to remove reflections from glass panes that separate you from your subject, and therefore cover most all of your view. Imagine cases like airplane windows, traveling in cars/trains, aquariums, zoos, sports like hockey, etc.,  Please refer to this Blog post to understand how to get best results from the tool, and how we are working to improve it.

[thomasd88842858]

Does not work on 27" iMac Sequoia 2020 With CAMERA RAW 17.1.0.2100, or iMac 2015 MONTEREY, 

[Ab van Polanen]

Still the same problem for me

[venketramar43814422]

Camera raw reflection removal not recognising Leica DNG file as RAW.  Please can it be clarified

[G0LDI]

cześć,

pierwszy raz ,przy redukcji odbić pomylił obraz za szybąz odbiciem,

ciekawy efekt

Pozdrawiam

G0ldi

[tennisnjt]

Not working for me.  Won't let me click on reflections. I have "New AI Features..." checked of in Technology Previews.  I have restarted the program. Seems like this would be a good image to try it on.  

[Conrad_C]

Your screen shot shows that Camera Raw has no Crop tool, and no Workflow Settings at the bottom. That means the image was opened in Camera Raw Filter, not the full Camera Raw processor. Camera Raw Filter doesn’t have access to full raw data, but reflection removal (like Denoise) currently requires raw data. So this is not a problem with the feature, but how the image was opened into Camera Raw.

Any method involving the command Filter > Camera Raw Filter will not work. 

Any method that renders the raw file to RGB before Photoshop will not work. 

To enable any feature requiring raw data, avoid Camera Raw Filter, and instead open the image directly into the full Camera Raw processor using any of these methods:

• From Photoshop, use the command File > Open and select the raw file. 
• From the desktop, drop the raw file directly into the empty Photoshop application window. 
• From Bridge, select the file and choose the command File > Open in Camera Raw. 
• From Lightroom Classic, select the file and choose Photo > Edit In > Open as Smart Object in Photoshop, then double-click the raw smart object layer (or choose Layer > Smart Objects > Edit Contents). 

[NicoleYM]

I'm not entirely sure if this response was directed at me or not. I opened the files using the Open as Smart Object in Photoshop method that you describe above. The tool was definitely working in the sense that it was trying to remove reflections. After the processing was completed, I could move the slider from 100 to -100 and see what it thought the reflection was. I just can't understand why so many people seem to be getting great results and the results that I'm getting are so poor. I feel like something must be wrong, but the problem definitely isn't how I'm opening the file.

[Conrad_C]

I'm not entirely sure if this response was directed at me or not.

By @NicoleYM

Your reply appeared below mine, which was below the post by tennisnjt, and I was replying to them. But, I’ll still comment on your reply 🙂

From what I have seen in this thread so far, you might be running into a legitimate problem/bug. You’re clearly able to enable the feature for your file and move the slider, so it isn’t some kind of basic incompatibility. If you’re still getting poor results after that, and if the photo should be a good candidate based on the constraints Adobe described in the blog article linked from their original post, then you might have an image type or GPU that reflection removal is having trouble with and Adobe needs to know about.

There have definitely been other people in this thread who also get the tech preview feature to work, but also get poor results. My guess is that Adobe doesn’t want those poor results to happen and wants to investigate and resolve those before this feature is graduated out of tech preview test mode.

[Eric29489323q7t4]

Nicole, please see my response to your question earlier in the forum. I'll copy-paste it below for you. Once you gain experience with the tool, I believe you will find that it is useful. That was our motivation for releasing it. 

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

"I haven't had any luck with removing reflections. Here's one photo that I thought would be a good candidate for the tool, but there was almost no change in the image after reflection removal. I've tried about 10 Nikon NEF files and a few Apple ProRaw photos and have had similar unimpressive results."

Hi Nicole, this photo is not a good candidate for two reasons. First, you can't see anything behind the reflection. Reflection removal will remove reflections that are semi-transparent; but, if the reflection looks opaque so as to prevent you from seeing anything underneath it, the tool will likely do nothing. 

The second reason is that the glass is not blocking your view of the subject (the reflection area is on the smaller side). Yes, your application is reasonable, and we would like to support it in the future, but the tool is currently designed to remove reflections from glass panes that separate you from your subject, and therefore cover most all of your view. Imagine cases like airplane windows, traveling in cars/trains, aquariums, zoos, sports like hockey, etc.,  Please refer to this Blog post to understand how to get best results from the tool, and how we are working to improve it

[VICENTE269896324jkf]

Thanks Conrad. I transferred the DNG´s from Lightroom Classic and following your method, at the end, I was able to use the reflection removal tool. I tried with some different pictues and some worked fantastic and some others didn´t work fine, but at least I got the tip to open them.

[uthier]

Not wortking on my MacBook Pro. I guess I'll have to change my name to Colin Smith..

[uthier]

 Opening a Nikon NEF file, and trying to remove reflections..

[Chapps-LA]

I've now worked with dozens of images and have a better idea of what works and what doesn't. I thought I'd share one photo - which isn't one which I'd typically use, given how zoomed out it is - where the remove reflection tool worked extremely well. A little more fiddling would make this a far better photo. I've attached the original image, the resulting image after reflection removal and color adjustment, and the file that shows what reflections the tool removed. 

[marks7722111]

I've only tried the new reflection removal tool a few times, but so far...wow. I take a lot of photos in museums, and that includes objects inside Plexiglas, plus paintings with glass protection. I'm constantly battling reflections. Other Photoshop tools help a lot, but can be tricky and time-consuming. I use a Mac Mini M2 Pro, and the refleciton removal tool uses only a few seconds to process. I have to open the file directly into Camera Raw for it to work, and then open it inside Photoshop to continue the workflow. I will want to try this on many more photos to see if the 'wow' factor holds up.

I'm looking forward to this tool working on jpeg, etc. I'd also love to see a tool that could remove glare, another museum photo challenge.

[Eric29489323q7t4]

Nice result! Museum display cases are difficult to work around, and to remove reflections from.

[joecos55]

Thought I would try another useless so called AI feature, opened 3 raw files tried all three and the tick box was grayed out the files were Nikon raw files.

[gnrd]

I tried using NEF files (Nikon) and converted to DNG and still the tool is greyed out on MBP M2Pro with 32GB RAM.

[regulab8962614]

Funktioniert bei mir (Mac-Userin) leider überhaupt nicht. Sieht aus wie ein grosser Farbfehler

[Ab van Polanen]

Still the same problem for me. Identical

[Pagolo]

It would be great to improve the elimination of reflections from the glasses.

[Eric29489323q7t4]

Please refer to this Blog post to see how we are working to expand the uses of this tool.

[Random A Photography]

I can't get it to let me even check the reflections box.  I did everything in the instructions