What you learned: Remove unwanted objects from a photo using the Healing Brush tool

How does the Healing Brush tool work?

The Healing Brush tool is useful for removing small, unwanted objects from your photos. When you paint on an area, the Healing Brush tool automatically samples pixels from a similar area. The sampled pixels are then merged with the original pixels to hide the distracting elements.

Remove distracting objects from your photos

1. Select the Healing Brush tool by clicking its icon in the column on the right or pressing the H key.
2. Use the Size slider in the Healing Brush settings to make the brush tip slightly larger than the object that you want to remove.
   
   
   
   Tip: Another way to change brush size is to press the left square bracket key on your keyboard to decrease brush size or the right square bracket key to increase brush size.
   
   
   
3. Click on or drag over the unwanted object. Lightroom CC will find a sample source and apply it to hide the distracting object. The two overlays that appear represent the source and destination of the healing adjustment.

Not satisfied with the healing result?

• If you’re not satisfied with the healing result, drag the source overlay to another area. Lightroom CC will then resample and apply a new adjustment.

Tip: If you don’t see the overlays, press the O key, which toggles between showing and hiding the Healing Brush tool overlays.

Clone Instead of Heal

• If you get a smudging effect in areas of high contrast, try changing the Mode in the Healing Brush settings from Heal to Clone. Heal blends pixels with the surrounding areas, which sometimes results in a smudge, while clone simply copies and pastes pixels from one area to another.

Want to delete the adjustment?

• To delete a heal or clone adjustment, select the blue pin overlay that represents that adjustment and press the Delete key (MacOS) or Backspace key (Windows).

Remove more complex objects in Adobe Photoshop CC

• If you want to remove a larger, more complex object, click the three-dot menu in the column on the right and choose Edit in Photoshop. Then use Photoshop’s powerful compositing tools to remove the object.
• When you’re done working in Photoshop, choose File > Save to save an edited copy of the photo back to Lightroom CC.