# Help removing shadows



## michelleb99 (Aug 27, 2008)

Hi,

I am totally new to using photoshop.  I took pictures at by brother in laws wedding and am trying to remove the shadows.  Can anyone give me a step by step?  I have been looking all over the internet for step by step instructions but I cant get anything to work.

Here is one of the pictures  Thanks for your help! 
Michelle

http://i496.photobucket.com/albums/rr324/michelleb_035/familyedited.jpg


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## Johnboy2978 (Aug 28, 2008)

Unfortunately, there is no quick fix, that I know of.  What I have done in the past was to use the magic wand to select the shadow area with about 20% sensitivity so that you are in effect masking off the shadow while not selecting the person's head.  From there, you can use the clone tool to clone in areas that are close to the shadow that were not effected by the flash, then de-select and move to the next effected area and so on.  It's pretty labor intensive and this is the kind of mistake you'll only do once.  After that, you'll make sure to take some test shots and correct it so that you get it right in the camera.  After you learn to properly bounce the flash you won't have this problem.


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## skieur (Aug 28, 2008)

Actually there is a quick fix.  It is a program called Viveza by Nik Software that handles shadows easier and much faster than Photoshop without masking or layers, tracing, magic wand etc.  It also of course handles several other kinds of adjustments.

skieur


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## Flash Harry (Aug 28, 2008)

Try using a stofen/similar diffuser on the flash head next time.
Dont shoot from a low angle.
Position people further from the background.
Get a flash bracket, or use off camera flash.
Shoot in landscape mode then crop to portrait.

These type shadows are hard to avoid especially shooting on camera flash in portrait mode and sorting later can be a pain and time consuming. The shot is ok and the client may be happy enough, show them the untouched version to see what they say, if they're unhappy do the work. H


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## sobrien (Aug 28, 2008)

There is actually quite an easy fix. The clone stamp tool will get rid of the shadows easily.


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## michelleb99 (Aug 31, 2008)

thank you for your feedback everyone.  I think I will try out that Viveza software.  I havent had any luck with cloning or using photshop.  Thanks so much for the suggestions!


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