How to crop a photo to remove the middle part

[Guest]

How do I crop a photo so that I can keep the sides of the photo but remove the middle part.

[JJMack]

You can do what you want but its not a crop.   Its more like punching a whole in the middle of an image or a layer.  The punch can be destructive or a non destructive clipping mask.

For example here I populated a collage template.   Select all seven layers and converted them into a smart object layer added a layer mask to punch a hole in the middle. Resized for the web and saved this png. The document still contains the full collage in fact all n layers are still intact in the smart layer's embedded object. Click on it to see the hole in it.

[Guest]

Thanks. I'm looking to crop out the middle and put the sides together, rather than punching a hole in the middle. Is there a reverse crop feature available? Whereby I can crop the part I don't want, rather than crop the part I want.

[JJMack]

You do not want to crop.  Sound more like you want to cut and paste and move areas.

crop (krp)

n.

1.

a. Cultivated plants or agricultural produce, such as grain, vegetables, or fruit, considered as a group: Wheat is a common crop.

b. The total yield of such produce in a particular season or place: an orchard that produced a huge crop of apples last year.

2. A group, quantity, or supply appearing at one time: a crop of new ideas.

3. A short haircut.

4. An earmark on an animal.

5.

a. A short whip used in horseback riding, with a loop serving as a lash.

b. The stock of a whip.

6. Zoology

a. A pouchlike enlargement of a bird's gullet in which food is partially digested or stored for regurgitation to nestlings.

b. A similar enlargement in the digestive tract of annelids and insects.

v. cropped, crop·ping, crops

v.tr.

1.

a. To cut or bite off the tops or ends of: crop a hedge; sheep cropping grass.

b. To cut (hair, for example) very short.

c. To clip (an animal's ears, for example).

d. To trim (a photograph or picture, for example).

2.

a. To harvest: crop salmon.

b. To cause to grow or yield a crop.

v.intr.

1. To feed on growing grasses and herbage.

2. To plant, grow, or yield a crop.

Phrasal Verb:

crop up

To appear unexpectedly or occasionally: "one of the many theories that keep cropping up in his story" (Christopher Lehmann-Haupt).

[Guest]

Yeah sorry. I would like to cut and paste photos similar to the one in your example.  How can I do that?

[JJMack]

A lot depends on the image. I chose this one for its easy for it has a solid white background. I selected middle character. Did edit cut, to delete it. Then did the same to the left one. Follow that with a edit past to paste it in as a new layer the can be moved. Changed the layer's blending mode to multiply.

[Riotearp07]

You posted this 4 years ago.. i just used this. thank you for your help!

[macskacska]

What program is this?

[HCDesigner1904]

I used to use Snagit, a screen capture tool, and it had a center crop function which I used all the time. It would be awesome if Photoshop and Illustrator could add something like that. You'd use the selection tool to say how much of the middle your wanted gone and it would remove the selection and pull the two sections together so that they meet either with an effect (torn edge or fade) or as if nothing was there. It was great for reducing unwanted white space or hiding sensitive information.

[JJMack]

With Window 10 you do not even need an external program like  Snagit to capture part of your desktop....

Windows 10 provides several ways of capturing screen contents.

1.  PrntScrn key to capture an image of the whole screen

2.  Ctrl-PrntScrn** key combination to capture an image of the whole screen, [including any visible right-click context menu]

3.  Alt-PrntScrn key combination to capture an image of the active window.

4.  Win-Shift-S [Windows 10 Ver 1703] - this captures a user-selectable area of the screen to the clipboard

5.  The Snipping Tool [Windows 7 onwards] - this captures a user-selectable area of the screen and allows it to be saved as a graphics file

** If your keyboard's PrntScrn key has two jobs then you may need to press the Fn key as well -> Fn-PrntScrn.