How precise does a mask need to be to avoid visible halos or fringing in a print?
Asked 9/30/2011
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I'm editing a RAW photo of a bronze horse-and-rider statue against a bright sky. I want to mask the statue so I can edit it separately from the sky, but when I zoom in I can still see a few leftover sky-colored pixels around the edges, along with some purple fringing at 100–200% view.
Do I need to clean up every pixel for this to look right in print, or is that overkill? How can I judge whether those edge pixels or the fringing will actually be visible, especially for prints around A3 size or larger?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
14y ago
2 Answers
1
If you want good results accurate making is essential. While you are unlikely to see the fringing itself on a print you can end up with the masked object looking like a cutout. This effect can be eliminated by going round the edge of the objects mask with a soft low opacity brush in order the feather the edges of the mask. This will eliminate the odd bright sky pixels that you see around the edge of your statue and should eliminate the fringing.
Originally by user6603. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user6603
14y ago
0
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You usually don’t need to fix every single pixel, but accurate masking does matter if you want the result to look natural.
The bigger issue isn’t whether you’ll see individual fringe pixels in a print, but whether the subject starts to look like a cutout because of a hard or contaminated edge. Leftover bright sky pixels can create a visible halo along the statue, even if the actual fringing isn’t obvious by itself.
A practical fix is to refine the mask edge rather than chasing individual pixels at extreme zoom. Go around the edge of the mask with a soft, low-opacity brush to gently feather and clean the transition. That will help remove stray sky pixels and reduce the appearance of the purple fringing.
So: pixel-perfect masking is usually unnecessary, but edge quality is essential. If the mask edge blends naturally at normal viewing size, it will usually print well.
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