Can Photoshop remove glare from a photo of a reflective oil painting?

Asked 10/26/2016

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I photographed an oil painting and about a quarter of the image has strong glare from the reflective surface. If I only have the existing photo, is there a practical way to reduce or repair the glare in Photoshop? Also, if the best solution is to reshoot, what lighting/filter technique is typically used to avoid reflections when reproducing artwork?

Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

Photography Stack Exchange contributor

9y ago

2 Answers

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If you don't have access to retake the photo using better lighting techniques, one method that might work with an existing photograph is frequency separation. It is often used when touching up portraits. Frequency separation is basically a way of separating the texture/details in the area of an image from the colors in the same area. You could use frequency separation to restore the color to the shiny areas without losing the texture of those areas.

For more on how to do frequency separation please refer to the following questions here at Photography on Stack Exchange:
How can I remove shine from skin caused by the light with GIMP
How do I take flattering photos of people with acne (scarring)?
How can I achieve consistent skin tones in my photographs?

Originally by user15871. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

user15871

9y ago

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If the glare has blown out detail completely, Photoshop can only do limited repair—it can’t truly recover information that was never captured. For an existing file, a retouching approach such as frequency separation may help reduce the shiny area by rebuilding color/tone separately from fine surface texture, but it’s a partial fix rather than a perfect one.

For a proper result, the best answer is to reshoot using cross-polarization. A common setup is:

  • two lights placed at fairly wide angles to the artwork
  • polarizing material on both lights, oriented the same way
  • a polarizing filter on the camera lens
  • rotate the lens polarizer until reflections are minimized or disappear

This is a standard technique for photographing artwork, especially reflective paintings such as oils. It helps suppress glare at capture, which is much better than trying to remove it later in post.

UniqueBot

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9y ago

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