How to Effortlessly Remove People from Photos

Annoyed by crowds of people getting in your images? Hate the thought of hours in front of the computer cloning them out? Wandering tourists and people can pose a real problem for photographers, but there’s an easy solution.

In this video tutorial, we show how to remove crowds of people automatically without hours of retouching. We’ll walk you through the process from start to finish!

Watch the Video

Overview of Video

Here’s a quick overview of what to expect throughout the video tutorial:

1. Shooting the Images on Location

We’ll start off by going on location, viewing the area to be photographed, and learning about the problems posed by wandering tourists and crowds.

2. Tips For Avoiding People

The tutorial then takes us into post-production, looking at how best to avoid crowds and people in the first place. By getting up at dawn, for instance.

3. Setting Up the Images and Running the Script

Here’s the main process of running the script within Photoshop:

1. Shoot lots of images to ensure you have area of the background without an obstruction
2. The first script is “Load Files into Stack”
3. It then runs the “Median” filter that will calculate and remove the intrusive objects
4. Nothing static is touched – only moving objects (so it’s only suitable for shooting a static scene)
5. A few tips for cleaning up the image are then covered

The technique is also excellent for removing image noise. You need Photoshop CS3 Extended for this but if you don’t have that version, I’ll show you a free service that promises to do the same thing for you.