Setting Spot Heal Options | Top Previous Next Learn more at BibbleLabs.com

Spot and Patch healing allows you to repair blemishes in your images or to remove unwanted parts of a scene by copying from a similar part of an image. Spot Healing blends out detail in a specific part of an image, while Patch Healing copies a part of an image (the source) over another part of an image (the destination). You can easily change from Spot Healing to Patch Healing to determine which is best for your image. For more information about lens correction effects, see the Understanding Advanced Image Editing Tools topic.

Each Heal point corrects separately for color (Chroma) and brightness (Luma), and each point can be set to correct for either Chroma or Luma or both.

Each Heal point has an adjustable size (Radius) that can be adjusted to ensure you only apply healing to a large enough area to fully cover the blemish in your image. You should use a Radius that is just larger than the item you are correcting. The hardness (Feather) of the Heal Point is also adjustable and is set as a percentage of the Radius of the Heal Point, and is shown as a dotted line within your Heal Point. The area within the dotted line will be have more Healing applied, and the healing will be smoothly blended into the original image between the dotted circle and the full circle.

Setting Spot Heal Destination:

1. | From the Tools menu, click Advanced.

2. | In the drop-down menu, click Spot Heal. This will reveal the options for the Spot Heal tool.

3. | Zoom your image to 100% by pressing CTRL+ALT+0 or selecting Zoom -> View Actual Pixels.

4. | Choose the Spot Heal cursor from the Bibble Toolbar.

5. | Click in your image on the location you would like to heal.

Note: The destination point in your image will be shown with a circle.

Moving a Spot Heal Destination:

1. | With the Spot Heal cursor selected, click your cursor on the destination you would like to move.

2. | Your cursor will change to a hand icon. Click and drag your destination to a new location.

Note: The destination point in your image will be centered on the point where you release the mouse button.

Change a Heal Spot to a Patch Spot:

1. | From the Tools menu, click Advanced.

2. | In the drop-down menu, click Spot Heal. This will reveal the options for the Spot Heal tool.

3. | Choose the Spot Heal cursor from the Bibble Toolbar.

4. | Select one of the current spots in your image by clicking within the point.

5. | Hold down the Control key while clicking in the image where you want the Patch Source to be.

Note: The source point for your Patch will be centered on the point where you release the mouse button

or

5. | Change Luma and / or Chroma correction mode to Patch in the Spot Heal Tool.

Note: The source point for your Patch will be automatically places near the deestination.

Change a Patch Spot to a Heal Spot:

1. | From the Tools menu, click Advanced.

2. | In the drop-down menu, click Spot Heal. This will reveal the options for the Spot Heal tool.

3. | Choose the Spot Heal cursor from the Bibble Toolbar.

4. | Hold down the Control key while clicking on the Source Point that you want to remove.

or

4. | Change Luma and Chroma correction mode to Heal or Preserve Original in the Spot Heal Tool.

Moving a Patch Heal Source:

Note: The destination point must have either Luma or Chroma set to Patch to have a source point.

1. | Select the Heal Point you want to adjust by selecting the Heal Cursor, and clicking within the point. The number of the heal point will be shown on the Spot Heal Tool.

2. | Move your cursor to the center of the Source Point. The cursor will change to a hand icon.

3. | Click and drag the Source Point to move it to a different area in your image.

Note: The destination point in your image will be centered on the point where you release the mouse button.

Removing a Spot Point:

1. | With the Spot Heal cursor selected, click within the point you would like to remove.

2. | The Spot Heal Tool will indicate which spot is selected by showing the spot number in the Current Spot field.

3. | Click the Red X icon on the Spot Heal Tool.

or

1. | Hold down the Control key while clicking the Spot Point you want to remove.

Note: Once a spot is removed, all settings for that spot are also removed, so it may be better to set both Luma and Chroma to "Preserve Original" to temporarily disable Healing on a single point.

Changing Spot Heal Options:

Each Heal Point can be set to correct for Luma and Chroma in one of the following modes:

1. | Heal: This mode blends away image blemishes without needing a Source Point.

2. | Patch: This mode copies from a Source Point onto the Heal Point.

3. | Preserve Original: This mode disables Healing.

To change Spot Heal Options:

1. | Select the Heal Point you want to adjust by selecting the Heal Cursor, and clicking within the point. The number of the heal point will be shown on the Spot Heal Tool.

2. | From the Spot Heal Tool, select the correction mode for Luma and Chroma.

3. | From the Spot Heal Tool, select the Radius and Feather percentage.

Keyboard Control of Spot Heal Options

Many of the options and controls on the Spot Heal can be operated by keyboard and mouse without needing to open the Spot Heal Tool window (available under Tools -> Advanced). You can create, move and delete points using just the mouse, and can change between Heal and Patch with the mouse (using the CTRL key in conjunction with the mouse, as described above).

You can use the Left Bracket key "[" to make the spot circle smaller and use the Right Bracket key "]" to make the radius larger.

Press and hold the Spacebar to briefly switch to the Pan Cursor - this will hide the Spot circles, allowing you to quickly judge your healing.

Related Topics

Understanding Basic Image Editing Tools

Understanding Advanced Image Editing Tools