Repair/Clone tool refinement

DxO PhotoLab Feature requests
1

The new Repair/Clone tool is an excellent enhancement - now making this a truly useful tool.

However, I reckon it needs some improvements;

  1. A new user would likely have difficulty finding the Clone tool - as it’s “hidden” within the Repair tool.
    – I suggest there be a new “Clone” button on the Toolbar (located next to the Repair button)
    – Clicking on Repair would start the Repair/Clone tool in repair mode
    – Clicking on Clone would start the Repair/Clone tool in clone mode

  2. Currently, both modes (Repair & Clone) work in the same basic way: We paint over the area to be replaced, and another area (that we can change/move) is used to replace the target.
    – I suggest these modes should work in different ways;
    – In Repair mode, it should work as it currently does
    – in Clone mode, I suggest it should work in the opposite way: in that we initially paint over the source area, which then points to the target area, which we can position/move as required.

Note: I currently use a workaround when I’m doing an explicit Clone;

  • I paint over the source area (as my initial selection, as tho it is the target area) - and then I move both the source & target areas, to swap them around … but, that’s a bit clunky.

John M

2

I don’t think that would be practical based on how the clone and repair tools work. Currently, drawing over the target area defines the size and shape of the source area mask which can then be moved to a more appropriate area for cloning. If you select the source area first it will be almost impossible to create a mask that will cover the target area accurately unless significant changes are made to how the masks are created. Two thoughts on that come to mind. The first would to be able to paint a different sized and shaped mask to cover the target than was used to select the source, The second would be the ability to change the boundaries of a mask to enlarge, shrink, or reshape it. In any case a change of this sort would probably be a significant effort, especially since the current functionally probably shares a significant amount of the code between the two features.

Additionally, it would not be intuitive for two tools, almost, identical in a significant number of respects, to work completely differently from one another.

Mark

3

Yes, that’s probably the deciding issue, Mark … I’ll stick with my workaround method.

I still reckon a dedicated Clone button would be handy tho … as per my #1 above

  • this would make the intended purpose of selecting the (so called) “Repair” tool more specific
    – so that when I’m repairing I’m placed into the Repair mode
    – and when I’m purposefully cloning from another part of the image I’m placed in the Clone mode
    – still with ability to switch between the 2 modes, as per current implementation.

John M

4

Thanks for this request John-M. It took me some time to understand how the clone tool was working actually. The online manual helped somehow, but it still required some amount of guesswork.
Initially I was looking fa keyboard shortcut enabling me to select the source area, like what I can find in other softwares, before choosing the target area.
Then when I understood how cloning works in PL, I realized the cloned and repaired indicators really look alike and it’s difficult to select one or the other to fine-tune your corrections, when you have done quite a few of them. At least differentiating the shape or color of each type of correction could help.

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