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How to Edit a Picture to Remove Shine

Use a photo editing program to remove shine from a digital picture. There are many photo editing programs that provide the ability to correct the brightness, color balance and the sharpness of pictures. More advanced photo editing programs, such as the popular Adobe Photoshop and free programs such as Gimp and Paint.net, provide a wider array of tools. There could be many causes of too much shine in a picture -- a flash or bright light source may appear where you don't want it to be.

Instructions

- 1
  Turn on your home computer, connect to the Internet and download the program you want to use. Adobe Photoshop has to be purchased, but does have a free trail. Paint.net and GIMP are free programs.
- 2
  Open the program you just downloaded. Click "File" and select "Get photo," or open from the drop-down menu. Locate and click the file of the photo from which you want to remove the shine. Click "Ok" in the bottom-right corner of the box to open the picture.
- 3
  Click the small "Band aid" icon in the left side margin. This is called the "Spot Healing Brush" in Photoshop and has similar names in the other programs. You can adjust the size of the tool in the settings window across the top of the program when it is opened. Adjust the size of the cursor, so it just fits over the shine you want to remove.
- 4
  Click the mouse button when you have positioned the tool over the picture. The program will remove the portion of the picture encompassed by the tool, and replace it with similar information from the surrounding area to rebuild the picture. This works well for small parts of the picture you want to change. For larger areas, you will need to work in stages, removing smaller portions of the affected area until it all is replaced.
- 5
  Click "File" and select "Save as" to give your edited photo a new name and save it to your computer. By saving it as separate file, you retain the original for future editing work.

Photography