Can someone help with this image?

scottduffy · 7 Dec 2014

Hi Folks,

I was wondering if someone could help me edit this photo. It is going to be blown up IF i can crop the image, remove the writing from the memorial they were sitting on and is converted to black and white. I am a complete novice with photoshop and although i can crop it and de-saturate the colours myself i cannot remove the writing.

I have resized it obviously so i'm not sure if i would somehow need to upload the original or email to whoever thought they could help me.

It's not the best photo i know that but after 1 hour when a 3 and 4 year old wouldn't stay close enough to be in the same shot and a 17 year old who would rather be anywhere else it'll have to do.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Regards

Scott

P.s

If you think it needs anything else removed then feel free. All i'm after is an improved black and white image at the end of the day.

jimmyjamjojo · 7 Dec 2014

Experiment with the spot removal or clone tool, given the uniform brightness of the monument it should be easy enough, you basically select a plain bit with one circle and place the other circle over the writing (you'l probably have to use lots of little ones). Give it a go, and if you really can't get on with it PM me and i'l try, i am by no means good with editing either though...

scottduffy · 8 Dec 2014

Thanks mate. I'll have a go after work tonight. I have no idea what i'm doing with photoshop cs5 so i just tend to crop and leave it at that.

StewartR · 8 Dec 2014

scottduffy said:
I am a complete novice with photoshop and although i can crop it and de-saturate the colours myself i cannot remove the writing.

Just a quick observation - de-saturation is one way to convert to B&W but it's rarely the best way. In this image, the woman's coat and hat are roughly as dark as the background, so if you just take the colour out it will leave them looking quite similar in tone. You might want to try playing with the channel mixers to improve the separation of the tones. (I use Lightroom rather than Photoshop so I don't know exactly how it works in Photoshop, but I'm sure there's something similar even if the terminology is slightly different.)

Here's a 30-second effort to illustrate my point. On the left is the image with a straight desaturation. On the right, I've boosted the reds and magentas and decreased the greens, and I think her coat and hat stand out from the background much better. I'm not happy with the kid's blue jacket and her hat which is now very bright, but then I only spent 30 seconds on it.

Sporty_Tog · 8 Dec 2014

I did a wee quick run over with the clone stamp tool then a B&W adjustment layer

BW_edit by campsiestreet, on Flickr

Hope that helps, but the file was quite small.

simonblue · 8 Dec 2014

Start again,and tell them if they don't behave Father Christmas won't be coming

scottduffy · 8 Dec 2014

simonblue said:
Start again,and tell them if they don't behave Father Christmas won't be coming

Thats exactly what i'm thinking mate. Saturday as a last attempt.

Thanks Stewart and sporty_tog. I can't upload any bigger file unfortunately although the original is about 5 or 6 times the size.

Rhodese · 8 Dec 2014

As Sporty_Tog said, you have offered a very small file.

Open in ACR see screen grab for B&W conversion.
Open in PS cropped to square adding extra to the sides.
Fill the extra space with content aware fill.
Paint in the young woman’s boot.
Paint out the lettering using the paintbrush tool, sampling from the nearby shades of grey/white.

Rhodese.

scottduffy · 8 Dec 2014

Thanks very much. I'll give it a go.