Clone and Patch

My wife loves taking pictures of the sunset from our deck. The problem is that there are these annoying powerlines in the way. After playing around with a few different combinations and techniques using the Clone and Patch tools in Photoshop, I eventually figured out how to remove many of these blemishes:




The main line, the one that crosses the median of the image, was removed using the patch tool. I marqueed out sections using the polygonal lasso tool and then applied the corrections using patch in the source mode. This is great for taking out details in conspicuous areas but that don't need to hold up to a lot of scrutiny. In full size, the edges of the correction are still slightly visible. This may be corrected by feathering the marquee, but that creates a strange blurry line that seems to be more visible than the single pixel issues that exist here.

For the lower lines in the branches by the right hand corner, I used the clone tool. By selecting a a very close sample, located perhaps no more than a brush stroke away, and applying the brush in small strokes the lines simply vanish. It's a bit more difficult when the area you're trying to correct is mottled, like the visible line that ran through the branches, and, as you can see, there are still some anomalies there, but overall one wouldn't know that there had been powerlines there at all.

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For my brushing, I opted to create a video tutorial. A friend of mine sent me a family portrait that needed some work. I created the following video to explain the process of using brush strokes to correct the issues. Due to length, I had to cut the video into two parts. If the second one isn't immediately available, you find it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fr0chm1M6XU