I want to use this to simplify the tones to help with evaluating eye travel. Most often I would use black, white and two or three intermediate grey tones.   I tried the posterize adjustment layer, but it appeared to have other things going on, actually creating more grey levels then I had set in the properties.    Maybe something using threshold settings? I've looked around for an action that would create this layer, but haven't found anything. Of course, knowing the proper steps I could just record them as an action.   Thanks, Russell ... View more

The Adobe support website says Denoise now it works with TIFFs and JPGs. However, my LR 14.0.1 still says, "Denoise is not currently compatible with this photo format." I've tried several different files of both types.   It may or may not be related, but the technology preview Preferences tab has disappeared in this version.   M1 MacBook Air, LR graphic processor set to "auto."    Thanks, Russell ... View more

The presets were correctly copied to the new folder: Library/Application Support/Adobe/Adobe Photoshop 2025/Presets   However, my custom scripts, stored at /Applications/Adobe Photoshop 2024/Presets/Scripts, were not copied to the new /Applications/Adobe Photoshop 2025 folder. I also found that although the keyboard shortcuts panel listed those scripts, their shortcuts had disappeared. (I suspect that when I launched 2025, it couldn’t find the scripts and deleted their shortcuts.)   Should my scripts instead be kept in Library/Application Support/Adobe/Adobe Photoshop 2025? Or is /Applications/Adobe Photoshop 2024/Presets the correct place? If so, do I just have to remember to manually copy the scripts to the new application folder each year?   ... View more

First of all, I've resolved the problem by resetting the edits and starting over. However, I would like to know what I might have done wrong, so I might avoid this in the future.   The DNG is 24 MB, from a Canon 6D Mark II. When it's open, LR generally lags when switching between modules, but it really boggs down when I open the masking panel. Toggling the overlay takes about 5 seconds. It takes 3-4 seconds to see the effect when clicking a mask's "eye" icon. There is several seconds delay between painting and seeing the stroke appear in the overlay, and as I move the brush the overlay appears in little blocks, instead of going down smoothly. It can take up to 10 seconds for the stroke to show in the history panel.    Here are the masks (2 gradients and 4 brushes): I optimized the catalog, deleted and re-created the 1:1 preview, and turned off  the graphics processor, but it didn't help.  Is it possible for a specific file's database entry to get randomly corrupted? Is there a way to rebuild the entry without starting over? Anything I might have done to corrupt the data?   Thanks, Russell ... View more

When you click the "Print Settings" button, you get a dialog box (strangely titled "Print" instead of "Print Settings"). You can change a variety of settings here, and the bottom of the box, your choices are to "Cancel" or "Save".   I assume if you click cancel, none of the changes you made take affect.   And if you click "Save," I assume it's saving any changes you've made. But where are these changes being saved?   It isn't saving to the Preset specified at the top of the box, below the Printer selection. I tested this:   With the default preset selected, I changed the Layout > Pages per Sheet from one page to two. In the "Presets" pop up, I selected "Save current settings as a preset," and named it "Two pages per sheet." With the "Two pages per sheet." preset selected, I changed Layout > Pages per Sheet from two pages to four. I clicked the "Save" button. When I reopened the print settings dialog and selected the "Two pages per sheet." preset, it was still set to two pages per sheet, instead of the "four" I thought I’d saved.   What's actually happening when I click this "Save" button?   ... View more

This is a small portion of a huge crowd watching the recent solar eclipse from the deck of a cruise ship off of Mazatlan. Unfortunately, this man disrupts the flow of a beautiful negative space flowing through the image.   What procedure would you recommend for removing the man in this photo, which I'll call "Photo A"?   I have a similar image, "Photo B," without the man, that I think will be useful, though the camera wasn't pointed as far downward. Both images are at the bottom of their camera frames:   I've tried duplicating the floor from Photo B to a layer in Photo A, but the lines don't align precisely. I suspect this is because it was shot with a 24 mm lens and there was a little distortion at the edges.    Should I use Transform on this layer from Photo B? I think it would need a little rotation, plus some skew or distort adjustments.   I would also have to be very careful to match the illuminance, color and grain, since the images were shot at different exposures and or different enough that a hard edge might show on the smooth areas. Perhaps I could feather the layer from Photo B.   Or would it be better to just use this layer from Photo B to get the blue backback and scooter wheel, and use tools like Patch and Clone Stamp on several layers with masks for the floor? (That sounds very tedious and error prone!)   There's also content-aware fill and the removal tool. Or some combination of these approaches?   Thanks, Russell   P.S. Do you know of a comprehensive, up-to-date, book or online course zeroing in on all aspects object removal in Photoshop?  ... View more

Sometimes when the Clone Stamp tool pastes, the result is more saturated (and sometimes) less detailed than the source.    In this example, I've sampled at the circle's location, and "pasted" right below, removing a halo from the edge of the shoulder. As you can see, the result is a little darker, and a little more saturated than the source. To adapt, I sometimes have to paste with a lower opacity, but that just helps approximate the appearance.   I'm only sampling the current layer. 100% hardness doesn’t help. I’ve reset the Clone Stamp tool. M1 MacBook Air Current Photoshop Eizo CS2740 display   Any idea what’s going on? I do a lot of heavy tonal and color manipulation, and, in spite of taking care, I often have a few halos to deal with.  ... View more

I think I must be doing something wrong. Surely Lightroom can make a mask that cleanly darkens an area by -1.00 without creating horrible artifacts.   Here's a detail of the "straight" image:   Here's with the overlay on to show the color range mask. What's causing the white ring?: Here's what happens when I reduce exposure by 1.00:   Is there a way to avoid the dark and light rings around the area I’m darkening?    Thanks, Russell ... View more

In the print settings menu, when I drill down two printer settings, none of the items on the menu are clickable (media type, checkboxes for 16 bit output, hi speedl printing, etc.) It's like I'm looking at a screenshot of the menu!   I've quit and restarted Photoshop, but it didn't help.   Any idea what the problem might be?   Thanks!   ... View more