How can I quickly remove dark lines and shadows from a background in Photoshop?

Asked 2/10/2015

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I have an image with a foggy red background and red dots/patterns that I want to keep, but there are unwanted black lines and shadows in the background. I tried using the Clone Stamp tool, but it takes too long. Is there a faster way in Photoshop to remove the dark lines while preserving the red pattern and background?

photoshop retouching background-removal editing

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

Photography Stack Exchange contributor

11y ago

2 Answers

Two steps in Photoshop:

Use the Eyedropper (I) to select the lightest background color that is not lighter than any part of the diffraction pattern you want to preserve.
Use the Paint Bucket (G) with mode "Lighter Color" and click on the image.

This will replace the dark lines and shadows with the color you selected in step 1. Here is an example:

enter image description here

Originally by user27832. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

user27832

11y ago

AI Answer

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Yes. A quick Photoshop method is to replace only the darker areas rather than cloning everything manually.

Try this:

Use the Eyedropper tool to sample the lightest background color that is still not lighter than any red detail you want to preserve.
Select the Paint Bucket tool.
Set its blending mode to Lighter Color.
Click the image/background area.

Because the Paint Bucket is in Lighter Color mode, it will affect only pixels darker than the sampled color, so the black lines and shadows can be replaced while the brighter red dots and background details remain intact.

This is much faster than Clone Stamp for this kind of cleanup, as long as the unwanted marks are darker than the background you want to keep.

How can I quickly remove dark lines and shadows from a background in Photoshop?

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