Today’s Question: Under Remove on the right panel in the Develop module of Lightroom Classic, sometimes the Heal tool works great, and if it doesn’t, I try using the AI feature. It seems that Heal samples from other areas of the photo. How can the user control where it selects from?
Tim’s Quick Answer: You can change the source area used for an image-cleanup area with the Heal and Clone options for the Remove tool in Lightroom Classic (or Camera Raw or Lightroom) by dragging the source area within the image.
More Detail: While the Remove mode for the Remove tool in Lightroom Classic, Camera Raw, and Lightroom will create pixels automatically based on an analysis of the image, with the Heal and Clone modes a source area of the image is copied to the destination area you drew. You can drag the source area to change where the pixels are copied from (and you can drag the source area to better align it if needed).
Of course, in order to move the cleanup area, you need to be able to see the tool overlay on the image. You can select “Always” from the Tool Overlay popup to have overlays for cleanup areas displayed whenever you’ve activated the Remove too. If you choose Auto from that popup, the overlays will only be shown when your mouse pointer is in the image preview area, and they will be hidden when you move the mouse pointer out of that area.
If an outline for the cleanup area you want to adjust isn’t shown, click on the icon representing the cleanup area to reveal the shape of the cleanup. You’ll then see matching shapes for the source and destination areas, with an arrow pointing from the source area to the destination area. Simply position your mouse over the area you want to move, and drag it to a new position.
