Post-Production: The Clone Stamp

After studying feminism at university along with photography, I developed something of a love/hate relationship with Photoshop, but I think we can all agree that when it's used for good, it can be a photographer's real saving grace. So while I'm not a huge fan of using it to make people look 'perfect', to remove wrinkles or change body shapes, there are an infinite amount of other uses for this tool and I'll never be done learning how to use it to improve my images. I certainly don't consider myself to be the most gifted post-processor in the world, in fact I only really use the most basic and minimal approach to post-production as I prefer to do as much in camera as I can to save time. But I thought it might be handy to share some of the techniques I use in my own work, for those of you who might be trying to learn Photoshop yourselves, or for anyone who might be interested to know the work that goes into my photographs after the initial photo session.

 So the first tool I wanted to look at is a very popular one for me, the 'clone stamp'. This tool allows me to select an area of an image and them replicate it to another area, 'stamping' a sample of the image elsewhere. I normally use this for removing things that I don't want in the picture, such as rogue limbs from passers by, blemishes on skin, etc. It's incredibly helpful for weddings, where I prefer to take a more documentary approach which means I might have my subjects in beautiful light, capturing a beautiful moment, but there's a glass of wine in the background that I can't remove without missing the shot, so I remove it in post instead.

In the above shot, it was such a bright day that I didn't even spot this passer by until I got the images onto my computer. It can be tricky using the clone stamp when there's a busy foreground and background, as you have to work with smaller samples to make the editing appear seamless.

I was kicking myself for this one, the image was posed, I could have just moved the bag. Why didn't I just move the flipping bag?

This shot was taken with lots of others without the two registrars in the background, however this one was actually my preferred one of the bride's expressions. This one took a lot of time, but thankfully, the panes of the windows meant I had lots of places to take samples from without it appearing too obvious.

The key to using the clone stamp is to take time and the smallest samples possible, matching the right texture, colour and light. It's a really simple and effective tool if you have the time an patients to use it!