How to Remove Red Eye From Photos

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By Richard Burke
eHow Contributing Writer

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Remove Red Eye From Photos

We have all taken photographs where the pupil eye color looks red instead of the natural eye color. This occurs when a flash or strobe light is used in low light levels. It does not always occur and is dependent on the strength of the flash, proximity to the subject and the amount of natural light available. The phenomenon occurs because the light of the flash is so fast that the pupil can’t close, allowing the light from the flash to reflect off the fovea at the back of the eye. Many flashes have red eye prevention which emits a pre-flash prior to taking the picture with the full flash. This helps, but still does not always work. The good news is that most image editing programs like Adobe Photoshop Elements have tools to automatically or manually remove red eye. Follow these easy steps to remove red eye from your photos

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

Adobe Photoshop Elements 6.0
Images with red eye

Step 1

Open the Image

Open your image in Adobe Photoshop Elements. There are two ways to remove red eye. From the Quick Edit mode you can select RED EYE FIX which will search the entire image and remove red eye automatically, depending on the slider adjustment which the user can adjust. The slider adjusts the “strength” of the red eye removal. You can open a batch of pictures and apply the automatic adjustment to all at the same time.
Step 2

Zoom In

The second method is to select the red eye tool from the tool palette at the left of the image. This tool will allow you to select a rectangular area and apply the red eye reduction to just that area. This allows you to apply a separate red eye adjustment to each area of the image. An automatic adjustment will rarely correct both eyes accurately; this method gives you more control over the image edit. Zoom in on the area before selecting it with the tool.
Step 3

Second Subject

When you are done correcting the area move to the next area of the image and select it with the tool. The tool will remove red eye from people wearing glasses without impacting the image highlights.
Step 4

Adjust Options

Notice that the use of the tool only corrected the right eye in this image. In many cases each eye will reflect differently and may require a second or even third application of the red eye tool. If you need to perform a second pass, adjust the PUPIL SIZE or DARKEN AMOUNT on the options bar at the top of the image.
Step 5

Final Image

The final version of the image contains no red eye. Also notice that the use of the tool did not impact the highlights, skin tones or any other image property. This is an easy way to deal with a common photographic image problem. Of course, if you want to spend a lot of time you can use color selection and airbrush the image like we used to do in the old days.