Almost all photographers face the problem of unwanted objects in their photos from time to time. Whether it’s a stray piece of paper on a desk or a speck of sensor dust ruining a portrait, there are times when part of an image needs to be removed.
Snipping tool for mac paste. Let’s say you’ve just taken a beautiful portrait of your best friend and you’re excited to get back home and start editing. But when you copy the photo to your computer, you realize there’s a tree coming out of your friend’s head! Noticing an unwanted object in a photograph is extremely frustrating, especially if it isn’t easy to recreate the shot. It can be especially frustrating for those who are photographing important events such as weddings.
Luckily, photo editing programs have made it easy to get rid of unwanted objects fast. Is there a tree growing out of someone’s head? A few clicks and — voilà! The tree has been replaced with a beautiful blue sky. Likewise, blemishes can be magically removed with basic photo retouching. Learning how to use the Clone Stamp tool can drastically change your editing.
The clone stamp is such a great tool because it lets you copy from one area of a photo to another using any type of brush. This can be useful for tricks such as covering up blemishes (by copying from another part of skin) or removing trees from a mountain view (by copying parts of the sky over them).
What is the Clone Stamp tool?
The Clone Stamp tool essentially allows you to copy one part of a photograph and brush it onto a different part. You can change the size, softness, and opacity of the brush. Learning how to use the Clone Stamp makes it easy for you to copy and paste different parts of an image regardless of their size. By choosing a soft brush, you won’t get any hard edges that make it obvious the image was edited.
The Clone Stamp tool replaces pixels with pixels, making edits look more seamless than if you were to use a paintbrush tool. It can be difficult to make cloned images look real at first. But once you learn how to use the Clone Stamp tool, you’ll be able to quickly and efficiently edit your images.
There are many different photo editors that you can use depending on your needs. The Photoshop Clone Stamp is arguably the most widely used because of Photoshop’s great reputation, but there are other, simpler programs you can use as well.
One of them is Luminar. It’s a direct competitor to Photoshop and has many of the same features. Luminar has its own Clone Stamp tool that can help you easily remove unwanted objects or add clones of objects. Learning how to use Clone Stamp in Luminar is just as easy as in Photoshop.
Luminar can be bought for a one-time fee, unlike Photoshop, making it an affordable alternative.
Luminar 3 - Time Does Matter
The fastest way to make your photos stand out Complex photo editing made easy with
AI powered tools
The fastest way to make your photos stand out Complex photo editing made easy with
AI powered tools
![Clone Stamp Tool For Mac Clone Stamp Tool For Mac](/uploads/1/2/4/8/124819085/907106848.jpg)
- Accent AI 2.0
- AI Sky Enhancer
- More than 70 Instant Looks
- Quickly erase unwanted objects
- Denoise
- Sharpening
- And - More
How to use Clone Stamp
To learn how to use the Clone Stamp tool, you’ll need to have a photo editing software that offers this tool. Once you’ve picked a photo editor, the next step is to select an image you want to edit. You can choose an image that needs some facial retouching, such as a portrait that has a few blemishes. Or you can choose a landscape that could use a bit more foliage (or animals, or water, or sky). Or you can choose any image that has an unwanted object you’d like to remove. Regardless of your choice, learning how to use the Clone Stamp is quick and easy.
How to use the Clone Stamp in Luminar 3
Let’s start by learning how to use the Clone Stamp in Luminar 3. I’ve chosen a simple landscape image as an example.
To find the Clone Stamp, click on the Tools drop-down menu in the top right of the workspace. You can also use Command + J on a Mac.
This will open the Clone Stamp window. At the top, you’ll see three different options: size, softness, and opacity. To make a simple cut and paste clone, keep your softness and opacity at 100%. The size of your brush determines the size of the area you’ll copy. Adjust it until the size works for you.
Tip: The size of the brush can easily be adjusted using the bracket keys on the keyboard: [ and ]. The left bracket makes the brush smaller, while the right bracket makes it bigger. Using these keys will increase and decrease the size by multiples of 12.
For this image, let’s say you’d like to start by adding a couple more trees to the landscape. When you open the Clone Stamp tool, you’ll get a prompt that says “click to set the source.” In this case, I’d like to set a tree as the source to paint that tree over another area of the landscape. When you set your source, it will appear as a target. A large circle will appear over the area you are painting. As you start to paint, you’ll see that the target moves as well.
With a couple of clicks, a new tree has appeared in the scene. If you keep clicking in different parts of the scene to paste more trees, you’ll realize the tool doesn’t work this way. It will begin to grab other areas of the image around the tree and start to paint those in. In order to paint the same tree in different areas, you’ll need to set the source every time. To do so, just hold down the Option key and click on your desired source.
Now we have a landscape with extra trees. But what if instead of adding more trees to the landscape we wished to remove some? Let’s start with the original image again and use the grass as the source instead of a tree.
By choosing different areas of grass as the source, you can easily remove unwanted trees from the photograph. You can apply this knowledge to any scenario. If there’s a blemish you’d like to get rid of, use nearby skin as the source. If there’s a power line in the sky, use the sky as the source. If you’d like to add more foliage to the background of an image, use the foliage as a source.
Let’s take a look at another example. To start, identify what you want to edit. Specifically, choose the area that you want to add something to (an empty patch of grass, in this example) and the object that you want to clone into that area (in our case, a lamb).
After making your mental selections, it’s time to move ahead. Pressing the Option key on your Mac will change your cursor to a crosshair. All you need to do now is paint over the object that you want to clone elsewhere.
The final step in using the Clone Stamp to duplicate the object is simply to click and hold down your mouse button while you paint over the area where you want the object to be cloned. As you move your cursor over the area, you’ll see the selected object being cloned. Once you’re happy with the cloning, click Apply to return to the main editing menu.
As you can see, it’s straightforward to learn how to use the Clone Stamp in Luminar. In just four simple steps, you can make lamb clones appear in your photo.
Now that you know how to use the Clone Stamp to remove or duplicate objects in your photos, go ahead and download a free trial of Luminar and give it a shot yourself!
Other uses for the Clone Stamp tool
The Clone Stamp tool in Photoshop and Luminar is designed to clone objects, but it can also heal parts of a photo. If you have an image where some detail is missing — a broken part of a brick wall, for instance — you can use the Clone Stamp tool to fill in the details using these same four steps. This way you can make old and tattered objects look whole.
Another great use of the clone tool in Photoshop and Luminar is for removing objects from a photo. If we take the last image above as an example and we wish to remove one of the lambs, all we need to do is follow the same steps, but in this case we would select an empty patch of grass on the right side of the frame as the source and paint over one of the lambs.
Using the Photoshop Clone Stamp tool
Learning how to clone in Photoshop is easy. Let’s open an image with an unwanted object. This simple image of a beach could be fine as is, but let’s say you want to get rid of the person as well as the twig floating in the water. This is easily done with the Photoshop Clone Stamp.
The clone tool in Photoshop can be found on the left side of the screen in the toolbar. The Photoshop Clone Stamp looks like a traditional rubber stamp. It can easily be accessed with the keyboard shortcut S. Just like in Luminar 3, the Photoshop Clone Stamp acts by choosing a source and then painting that source over a different area of the image. You can change the size and hardness of the brush, the opacity, and the flow of the Clone Stamp tool in Photoshop. Normally, you would leave the opacity and flow at 100% and adjust the brush size based on your image. For hardness, choose a lower percentage. Using 100% hardness will create sharp edges, while less than that will soften the edges.
You can use the bracket keys to adjust the size of the clone tool in Photoshop just like you can in Luminar. To get rid of both the person and the twig, choose areas of the water to use as your source, then paint over the unwanted objects.
With a few simple clicks, both the person and the twig are gone! The Photoshop Clone Stamp and the Luminar 3 Clone Stamp work in the same way and allow the same adjustments to opacity, brush size, and softness (called hardness in Photoshop). And just like in Luminar, in Photoshop you can simply use Option + click to choose a new source. When you begin to paint, the area you’re painting will show up in a large circle, while your source will show up as a cross.
Learning how to use the Clone Stamp is fun and easy. If you’re ready to bring your post-processing to the next level, download a free trial of Luminar 3 today.
Luminar 3 - Time Does Matter
The fastest way to make your photos stand out Complex photo editing made easy with
AI powered tools
The fastest way to make your photos stand out Complex photo editing made easy with
AI powered tools
- Accent AI 2.0
- AI Sky Enhancer
- More than 70 Instant Looks
- Quickly erase unwanted objects
- Denoise
- Sharpening
- And - More
Using a variety of Photoshop tools, you can easily touch up blemishes, whiten teeth, correct red eye, and fix many other imperfections in your images.
Note:
Photoshop doesn't support opening or editing banknotes or currency notes. See Counterfeit Deterrence System (CDS).
The Clone Source panel (Window > Clone Source) has options for the Clone Stamp tools or Healing Brush tools. You can set up to five different sample sources and quickly select the one you need without resampling each time you change to a different source. You can view an overlay of your sample source to make it easier to clone the source in a specific location. You can also scale or rotate the sample source to better match the size and orientation of the cloning destination.
For timeline-based animations, the Clone Source panel also has options for specifying the frame relationship between the sample source video/animation frame and the target video/animation frame. See also Cloning content in video and animation frames.
The Clone Stamp tool paints one part of an image over another part of the same image or over another part of any open document that has the same color mode. You can also paint part of one layer over another layer. The Clone Stamp tool is useful for duplicating objects or removing a defect in an image.
You can also use the Clone Stamp tool to paint content on video or animation frames. See also Cloning content in video and animation frames.
To use the Clone Stamp tool, you set a sampling point on the area you want to copy (clone) the pixels from and paint over another area. To paint with the most current sampling point whenever you stop and resume painting, select the Aligned option. Deselect the Aligned option to paint starting from the initial sampling point no matter how many times you stop and resume painting.
You can use any brush tip with the Clone Stamp tool, which gives you precise control over the size of the clone area. You can also use opacity and flow settings to control the paint application to the cloned area.
![History brush tool History brush tool](/uploads/1/2/4/8/124819085/605971881.jpg)
- Choose a brush tip and set brush options for the blendingmode, opacity, and flow in the options bar.
- To specify how you want to align the sampled pixels andhow to sample data from the layers in your document, set any ofthe following in the options bar:Samples pixels continuously, without losing the currentsampling point, even if you release the mouse button. Deselect Alignedto continue to use the sampled pixels from the initial samplingpoint each time you stop and resume painting.Samples data from the layers you specify. To sample fromthe active layer and visible layers below it, choose Current AndBelow. To sample only from the active layer, choose Current Layer.To sample from all visible layers, choose All Layers. To samplefrom all visible layers except adjustment layers, choose All Layersand click the Ignore Adjustment Layers icon to the right of theSample pop‑up menu.
- Set the sampling point by positioning the pointer inany open image and Alt-clicking (Windows) or Option-clicking (Mac OS).Note:Make sure you are not workingon an adjustment layer. The Clone Stamp tool does not work on adjustmentlayers.
- (Optional) In the Clone Source panel, click a clone sourcebutton andset an additional sampling point.You can set up to five different sampling sources. TheClone Source panel saves the sampled sources until you close thedocument.
- (Optional) Do any of the following in the Clone Sourcepanel:
- To scale or rotate the source that you’recloning, enter a value for W (width), H (height), or the rotationin degrees .
- To reverse the direction of the source (good formirroring features like eyes), click the Flip Horizontal or FlipVertical buttons.
- To show an overlay of the source that you’re cloning, select Show Overlay and specify the overlay options.
Note:Select Clipped to clip the overlay to the brush size. - Drag over the area of the image you want to correct.
Using the Clone Stamp or Healing Brush tool, you can sample sources in the current document or any open document in Photoshop.
When cloning video or animation, you can set sampling points in the current frame you’re painting or sample sources in a different frame, even if the frame is in a different video layer or in a different open document.
You can set up to five different sampling sources at a time in the Clone Source panel. The Clone Source panel saves the sampling sources until you close the document.
- To clone video or animation frames, open the Animation panel (if you’re not cloning video or animation frames, skip to step 2). Select the timeline animation option and move the current-time indicator to the frame with the source you want to sample.
- To set the sampling point, select the Clone Stamp tooland Alt-click (Windows) or Option-click (Mac OS) in anyopen document window.
- (Optional) To set another sampling point, click a differentClone Source button inthe Clone Source panel.You can change the sampling source for a Clone Source buttonby setting a different sampling point.
- Select the Clone Stamp or Healing Brushtool and set one or more source samples.
- In the Clone Source panel, select a clone source andthen do any of the following:
- To scale the sample source, enter a percentagevalue for W (width) or H (height) or scrub W or H. The default isto constrain proportions. To adjust the dimensions independentlyor restore the constrain option, click the Maintain Aspect Ratiobutton .
- To rotate the sample source, enter a degree valueor scrub the Rotate The Clone Source icon .
- To reset the sample source to its original sizeand orientation, click the Reset Transform button .
Adjust the sample source overlay options tosee the overlay and underlying images better when painting withthe Clone Stamp and Healing Brush tools.
Note:
Totemporarily display the overlay while painting with the Clone Stamptool, press Alt+Shift (Windows) or Option+Shift (Mac OS).The brush changes temporarily to the Move Source Overlay tool. Dragto move the overlay to another location.
- In the Clone Source panel, select Show Overlayand do any of the following:
- To hide the overlay while you apply thepaint strokes, select Auto Hide.
- To clip the overlay to the brush size, enable the Clipped option.
- To set the opacity of the overlay, enter a percentagevalue in the Opacity text box.
- To set the appearance of the overlay, choose eitherthe Normal, Darken, Lighten, or Difference blending mode from thepop‑up menu at the bottom of the Clone Source panel.
- To invert the colors in the overlay, select Invert.
Note:To help align identical areas in the source overlayand underlying image, set Opacity to 50%, select Invert, and deselectClipped. Matching image areas will appear solid gray when aligned.
When using the Clone Stamp tool or Healing Brush tool, you can paint with the sampled source anywhere in the target image. The overlay options help you visualize where you want to paint. However, if you paint in a specific location relative to the sampling point, you can specify the x and y pixel offset.
- In the Clone Source panel, select the source youwant to use and enter the x and y pixel values for the Offset option.
Note:Beginning with the Photoshop CC 2015.5 release, you have an option to revert to the legacy Photoshop CC 2014 behavior for the Healing Brush tool. Select Preferences > Tools > Use Legacy Healing Algorithm For Healing Brush. For more information about Photoshop version history, see the New features summary.
The Healing Brush tool lets you correct imperfections, causing them to disappear into the surrounding image. Like the cloning tools, you use the Healing Brush tool to paint with sampled pixels from an image or pattern. However, the Healing Brush tool also matches the texture, lighting, transparency, and shading of the sampled pixels to the pixels being healed. As a result, the repaired pixels blend seamlessly into the rest of the image.
The Healing Brush tool can be applied to video or animation frames. See Examples for the Healing Brush in Photoshop for tips and samples of the Healing Brush in action.
- Click the brush sample in the options bar and set brushoptions in the pop‑up panel:Note:If you’re using a pressure-sensitive digitizing tablet,choose an option from the Size menu to vary the size of the healingbrush over the course of a stroke. Choose Pen Pressure to base thevariation on the pen pressure. Choose Stylus Wheel to base the variationon the position of the pen thumbwheel. Choose Off if you don’t wantto vary the size.Specifies the blending mode. Choose Replace to preservenoise, film grain, and texture at the edges of the brush strokewhen using a soft‑edge brush.Specifies the source to use for repairing pixels. Sampledto use pixels from the current image, or Pattern to use pixels froma pattern. If you chose Pattern, select a pattern from the Patternpop‑up panel.Samples pixels continuously, without losing the currentsampling point, even if you release the mouse button. Deselect Alignedto continue to use the sampled pixels from the initial samplingpoint each time you stop and resume painting.Samples data from the layers you specify. To sample fromthe active layer and visible layers below it, choose Current AndBelow. To sample only from the active layer, choose Current Layer.To sample from all visible layers, choose All Layers. To samplefrom all visible layers except adjustment layers, choose All Layersand click the Ignore Adjustment Layers icon to the right of theSample pop‑up menu.Controls how quickly the pasted region adapts to the surrounding image. Select a lower value for images with grain or fine details, or a higher value for smooth images.
- Set the sampling point by positioning the pointer overan area of the image and Alt-clicking (Windows) or Option-clicking(Mac OS).Note:If you are sampling from one image and applying to another,both images must be in the same color mode unless one ofthe images is in Grayscale mode.
- (Optional) In the Clone Source panel, click a clone sourcebutton andset an additional sampling point.You can set up to five different sampling sources. The Clone Source panel remembers the sampled sources until you close the document you’re editing.
- (Optional) In the Clone Source panel, click a clone sourcebutton to select the sampled source you want.
- (Optional) Do any of the following in the Clone Sourcepanel:
- To scale or rotate the source that you’recloning, enter a value for W (width), H (height), or the rotationin degrees .
- To show an overlay of the source that you’re cloning,select Show Overlay and specify the overlay options.
- The sampled pixels are melded with the existing pixelseach time you release the mouse button.
Note:
If there is a strong contrast at the edges of the area you want to heal, make a selection before you use the Healing Brush tool. The selection should be bigger than the area you want to heal and precisely follow the boundary of contrasting pixels. When you paint with the Healing Brush tool, the selection prevents colors from bleeding in from the outside.
The Spot Healing Brush tool quickly removesblemishes and other imperfections in your photos. The Spot HealingBrush works similarly to the Healing Brush: it paints with sampledpixels from an image or pattern and matches the texture, lighting,transparency, and shading of the sampled pixels to the pixels being healed.Unlike the Healing Brush, the Spot Healing Brush doesn’t requireyou to specify a sample spot. The Spot Healing Brush automaticallysamples from around the retouched area.
Using the Spot Healing Brush to remove a blemish
Note:
For retouching a large area or for more control over the source sampling, you can use the Healing Brush instead of the Spot Healing Brush.
Free Clone Stamp Tool For Mac
- Select the Spot Healing Brush tool fromthe toolbox. If necessary, click either the Healing Brush tool,Patch tool, or Red Eye tool to show the hidden tools and make yourselection.
- Choose a brush size in the options bar. A brush thatis slightly larger than the area you want to fix works best so thatyou can cover the entire area with one click.
- (Optional) Choose a blending mode from the Mode menuin the options bar. Choose Replace to preserve noise, film grain,and texture at the edges of the brush stroke when using a soft‑edgebrush.
- Uses pixels around the edge of the selection to findan area to use as a patch.Uses pixels in the selection to create a texture. Ifthe texture doesn’t work, try dragging through the area a secondtime.Compares nearby image content to seamlessly fill the selection, realistically maintaining key details such as shadows and object edges.Note:The create a larger or more precise selection for the Content-Aware option, use the Edit > Fill command. (See Content-aware, pattern, or history fills.)
- Select Sample All Layers in the options bar to sampledata from all visible layers. Deselect Sample All Layers to sampleonly from the active layer.
- Click the area you want to fix, or click and drag tosmooth over imperfections in a larger area.
Video | Retouching cars in Photoshop
Video | Retouching cars in Photoshop
The Patch tool lets you repair a selectedarea with pixels from another area or a pattern. Like the HealingBrush tool, the Patch tool matches the texture, lighting, and shadingof the sampled pixels to the source pixels. You can also use thePatch tool to clone isolated areas of an image. The Patch tool workswith 8‑bits or 16‑bits-per-channel images.
Note:
Free Clone Stamp Tool For Mac
Whenrepairing with pixels from the image, select a small area to producethe best result.
For information about using the Content-Aware Patch tool options, see Content-Aware Patch and Move.
- Drag in the image to select the area youwant to repair, and select Source in the options bar.
- Drag in the image to select the area from whichyou want to sample, and select Destination in the options bar.
Note:You can also make a selection prior to selecting thePatch tool.- Shift-drag in the image to add to the existingselection.
- Alt-drag (Windows) or Option-drag (Mac OS)in the image to subtract from the existing selection.
- Alt+Shift-drag (Windows) or Option+Shift-drag (Mac OS)in the image to select an area intersected by the existing selection.
- To extract texture with a transparent background fromthe sampled area, select Transparent. Deselect this option if youwant to fully replace the target area with the sampled area.Note:The Transparent option works best for solidor gradient backgrounds with clearly distinct textures (such asa bird in a blue sky).
- To control how quickly the pasted region adapts to the surrounding image, adjust the Diffusion slider. Select a lower value for images with grain or fine details, or a higher value for smooth images.
- Position the pointer inside the selection, and do oneof the following:
- If Source is selected in the options bar,drag the selection border to the area from which you want to sample.When you release the mouse button, the originally selected areais patched with the sampled pixels.
- If Destination is selected in the options bar, drag theselection border to the area you want to patch. When you releasethe mouse button, the newly selected area is patched withthe sampled pixels.
- Drag in the image to select the area you want to repair.Note:You can also make a selection prior to selecting thePatch tool.
- If desired, complete steps 3-4 above to adjust the selectionand apply pattern texture with a transparent background.
- Select a pattern from the Pattern panel in the optionsbar, and click Use Pattern.
Video | Removing red eye and whitening teeth
Video | Removing red eye and whitening teeth
Photoshop Principal Product Manager Bryan O'Neil Hughes shows how to remove red-eye and whiten teeth using Photoshop in this episode of the Photoshop Playbook.
TheRed Eye tool removes red eye in flash photos of people or animals.
- In RGB Color mode, select the Red Eye tool . (TheRed Eye tool is in the same group as the Spot Healing Brush tool . Holddown a tool to display additional tools in the group.)
- Click in the red eye. If you are not satisfied with theresult, undo the correction, set one or more of the following optionsin the options bar, and click the red eye again:Increases or decreases the area affected by the Red Eyetool.Sets the darkness of the correction.
Note:
A reflection of the camera flash in the subject’s retina causes red eye. You’ll see it more often when taking pictures in a darkened room because the subject’s iris is wide open. To avoid red eye, use the camera’s red eye reduction feature. Or, better yet, use a separate flash unit that you can mount on the camera farther away from the camera’s lens.
Video | Light correction & removing unwanted objects
Video | Light correction & removing unwanted objects
Adobe Photoshop Clone Stamp Tool
Photoshop Principal Product Manager Bryan O'Neil Hughes explains how to remove unwanted objects and use brush-based color dodging to equalize the luminance and color temperature of subjects.
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