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October 20, 2004

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Here's another presentation of the art of eliminating people from images. This picture was taken many years ago in Washington D.C. As the gentleman wanted me to take a picture of he and "his girl", I noticed that the girl didn't seem to be enjoying herself too much. So, as I took the picture of them with his camera, I also took a picture with my camera. Then she said, "Okay, now its my turn to get a picture of you." As she proceeded to do with her camera. We all went on our own separate ways. Later, while playing around on the computer, I decided that I wanted a picture of just her. I mean, do you think it was just a coincidence that I got her centered in the picture?

How I did it:
This image presented me with an interesting challenge. Everything else was fairly standard. Copy parts of the background over the subject to be eliminated. ("Clone" tool for most programs, or "Rubber Stamp" for Adobe Photoshop.) But where I ran into a challenge was where her left arm was actually behind the guy. It would look rather empty without her left arm there. So I tediously outlined and copied her right arm. I flipped it horizontally and paste it on her left side. Then, since she was standing at an angle, her left arm would have been further back in perspective. I resized the pasted arm to make it smaller and blended it with the coat.