Monte Carlo Casino

[Grumpy John]

This image of the Monte Carlo Casino was captured by pointing the camera at a big concave mirror standing in the park opposite the casino entrance. I actually entered this image in a Reflections challenge on Digital Photography Review and managed a 3rd out of about 100 entries. I thought, "how easy is this competition thing", came thudding back to earth when my next entry placed about 93 out of ~100 entries.

Canon 5D Tamron 28-300 @ 168mm
f16.0, 1/50 sec., ISO 100.

[seaslug]

That worked pretty well. I do wonder about the big penis shaped shadow in the foreground is all about though. 🤔

[HansE]

I just had a congratulation from a picture entry placed ahead of 230000 entries I was in the top 10%

[Grumpy John]

Well done Hans.

[Isac]

Yippee for Hans !!! Are you going to post the pic for all to see?

[Isac]

I think it's pretty clever John. Well spotted and a very colourful image. Nice shot - except for the penis

[Grumpy John]

Feel free to put you photoshop skills to work.

[Isac]

This is a family forum John - we'll have none of that here thank you very much!!!

[Isac]

Phallic symbol has tastefully been removed to protect our young viewers.

[Isac]

I used quite a few tools John so it would be a large tut. Basically I just coned the grass section then for the rest, I do my own thing of copying similar sections to new layers, move them into position then reshape them to fit. I then use hue/sat and levels to make the colours the same. It was very involved but I'm used to doing this type of editing so it didn't take long to do. I'll have a crack at doing something similar for a tut (when time permits).

[Grumpy John]

Thanks for the explanation Isac. A tute would be nice when you have the time, no rush.

[Isac]

I'll do a tut but make it for the very basic shadow removal. There are so many different ways to do removal of just about about anything in PS and I determine which method I choose by examining closely, the content of the image.

[seaslug]

Can't match Isac's mastery of it, but I had to have a go!

[Isac]

Pretty good edit Greg - nice work.

[seaslug]

Thanks, should have spent a little more time on it to tidy it up, but really it was just a play for practice.

[Grumpy John]

Now that the phallic symbol has been removed that dark spot just below the centre of the disk on the RHS is bothering me.

Not any more, simple content aware fill.

[Isac]

Good work John. It could have been done just as easily using one click with the "Spot Healing Brush Tool". I use these tools just about every day for quick cleanups.
Just make the selection circle slightly bigger than the part you want gone, and click. Hey Presto - it's gone! To resize selection tools use the right and left square brackets - next to the "P" key.

[Grumpy John]

Just tried it, worked like a charm, and no fiddly drawing around the shape.

[Isac]

It is the easiest option John and it is very effective for cleaning up old photos with "spots" on them. It's a very steep learning curve and very time consuming but I'm still learning after all these years of using PS.

[Grumpy John]

I have used that method to remove footprints in sand. I don't think you would ever stop learning photoshop. Every photo presents new challenges and opportunities.

[Isac]

Here's another quick way to resize the brush tools:
Hold down the Alt key and hold down the Right Mouse button then:
Drag left or right to decrease/ increase brush size and drag up/down to decrease/ increase brush hardness.
This is what it looks like: