MacLife - UK (2020-04)

Select white edges
In the Tools panel, choose the Magic
Wand tool. Hold Shift and click to select the
white edges. Choose Select > Modify > Expand.
Use a value of two pixels to make the selection
marquee overlap the contents of the photo.

Select a person
Press C+D to deselect the marquee. In
the Modify section of the Tools panel, click to
choose the Content–Aware Move tool. Draw
a selection round the subject you want to move.
In the Options bar, tick Transform On Drop.

Examine the results
The Content–Aware Move tool will
try to fill the person’s original location with
appropriate pixels. It will also try to blend the
repositioned person in with their new location.
We then need to manually tidy things up.

Fill the white edges

Choose Edit > Fill Selection. In the Fill

Layer window set the drop–down menu to

use Content–Aware. Click OK. This intelligent

tool then fills the selected white edges with

appropriate pixels of tree, grass, water, and sky.

Move and scale

Drag to move the selected subject.

Drag the Transform box’s control handles to

scale the figure up so that they match the size

of the adjacent subject. Click the check to apply

the move and transformation.

Tidy up

Grab the Clone Stamp tool. Press Opt

and click to sample grass next to the relocated

subject and spray to extend the grass up to the

edges. Sample and spray grass, tree and lake

pixels over the half–hidden bench.

JARGON BUSTER

Elements 2020 has a new

Auto Selection tool that

uses Content–Aware

recognition to make

selections quickly. Simply

draw a rectangle around

a person and their

complex outline will

become selected.

GENIUS TIP

The Spot Healing brush

does a great job of tidying

up unwanted pixels left

over from a Content–

Aware Move procedure.

Set it to Proximity in

the Options bar. It will

automatically sample and

relocate nearby pixels

over the problem area.

How to do anything on your Mac, iPhone & iPad

Image rights: Adobe. maclife.com APR 2020 83