Retouching Tools

  The Clone Stamp

Use the clone stamp to “paint” one part of a picture onto another. Usually you will be doing this because you want to cover up something using a background texture from some area with a similar background, but no foreground. Some typical things covered up this way are telephone wires and pimples.

The Clone Stamp [S] is on the Editor toolbar.

After activating the tool, press and hold down the [Ctrl] key (the mouse cursor changes to a crosshairs) to set the source area for cloning. After that, the tool will start cloning the source area (“painting” with it) wherever you click or drag with it. The Radius sets how large an area of the picture is transferred, Opacity is the maximum allowed amount of transfer (achieved by repeatedly using the tool over the same part of the picture), Density is the amount of the picture applied during one use of the effect over a part of the picture. In Aligned mode, the source area will always move with the target area. When this mode is off, the source will always return to the original point when you let go of the mouse button and then start “painting” again.

Spacing sets how often the tool should be applied. You set it as a percent of the brush size. Thus with small values, the tool will be applied during even the tiniest motion of the mouse, while with a value of 100%, it will be applied only once per full brush length.

Blur The Blur value sets how the tool will behave at the brush edges.

Use the Mode to set how the cloned part of the picture blends into the original picture.

  Iron

Use the Iron to iron out fine details, like in portrait photography. To activate it, use the toolbar button named Iron [U].

The settings for Radius, Opacity, Density, Blur and Spacing work the same as they do for the other tools, e.g. the Clone Stamp. The Smoothing setting determines the effect’s strength.

  Effect Brush

Use the Effect Brush tool to “paint on” local picture edits. To activate it, use the toolbar button named Effect Brush [E].

What precisely this tool does at a given moment depends on which Effect: option you have set: brightness, gamma, contrast, saturation, or sharpening. It also depends on your setting for Strength. The other settings, like Radius, Opacity, Density, Blur and Spacing work the same as they do for the other tools, e.g. the Clone Stamp.

  Healing Brush

Use the Healing Brush [J] to remove minor scratches and distracting spots and replace them with material from the healthy, “clean” part of the picture. Work with this tool as you would with the Clone Stamp while keeping in mind that this tool does not transfer the source region itself, but just its texture, which is adapted to the target area as you apply it.

Dodge

Use the Dodge [I] tool to easily brighten a part of a picture. Use this tool’s setting to set the Range of tones that the tool works with – lights, midtones, or shadows. Strength sets the strength of the brightening. Leave the Protect Tones option active to make the program preserve the picture’s colors during dodging. Hold down [Alt] to temporarily switch to the Burn tool.

Burn

The Burn [Shift + I] tool has the same settings as Dodge, but is used for darkening the picture. Hold down [Alt] to temporarily switch to the Dodge tool.

  Tablet Support

Zoner Photo Studio supports work with a tablet for all of its retouching tools. Clicking the Tablet Settings button will open a window where you can ask the program to vary one option based on the pen pressure that the tablet measures as you draw. The options you can affect using pen pressure are as follows: Radius, Opacity, Density, Blur, and Spacing. Of course, all this only apply if the current tool actually has the given option.

More Information

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