Messing around with "Content Aware" in Photoshop (manipulating Mars images)

Long story short, I like to make panoramas and composites from the Mars missions. Being that I use Photoshop, I learned that there is a feature called "Content Aware" that can blend away things or fill in things with 3 mouse clicks.

I found out about it because I wanted to fill in the sky for the Sol 3 panorama (just wanted to add the butterscotch sky so there was no white, or missing data).

While testing it out, I came across a startling conclusion - images can so easily be manipulated these days, it's ridiculous. Who knows if what we see anymore is even real (photo/image-wise).

So here is one image, but two versions. The top one is the original. The bottom one took me 3 minutes to remove the rocks. Can you tell how many I removed? I also added a Youtube video showing the images back and forth.









Check out the video in 1080...

Original image from NASA/JPL website:

mars.jpl.nasa.gov...

Interesting...I utilize this feature a lot on my photographs that have the unfortunate lens flare. I know how it works and it works much like the clone/heal tool but its much more precise and efficient.

What I find really interesting is that I remember a thread not too long ago where someone was posting that they saw "clone" artifacts in NASA images...he had an absolutely AMAZING eye and I wouldn't have ever noticed had it not been for his thread.

I am going to search for that thread now, I'll edit this post and add the thread if/when I find it.

Edit: here is the thread I was talking about, however I appears the conclusion was from stitching "panorama" I'm not entirely sure if the OP of this thread followed through on raw images that weren't stitched.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

You make a great point, OP. I'm just learning photoshop myself and on one hand I love the content aware tools and other things they've built in over the last few versions to make photo editing and modification so simple. It really is a godsend.

Of course, the flip side is what you note. Especially with the Content Aware improvements and additions of CS-6, what's always been possible is now so easy and idiot proof to do almost flawlessly, I'm not sure I'll ever trust a questionable photograph again. There is just no way to be 100% sure anymore, if someone is good enough. Sadly, even the certified 'experts' on Adobe Photoshop we have at the college conceded that if someone is willing to put some time into it and have skill? There is no telling real from fake. Not 100% on examination of the modified graphic anyway.

Talk about good with the bad eh?

Thank you very very much for this.

This open a very Big Questions on Manipulation Images that could come from NASA...... and how is easy to do that before show them publicly .

S&F.

reply to post by Arken

This open a very Big Questions on Manipulation Images that could come from NASA...... and how is easy to do that before show them publicly .

NASA makes the raw data publicly available; that is why the OP is able to make panoramas using his own software. NASA does not usually clone data; that is why there are sometimes black rectangles on stitched images. Private citizens, like the OP, sometimes do clone images, or make photo-montages. There is no reason why they should not, as they are interested in making pretty pictures rather than portraying visual information accurately.

Originally posted by DJW001
reply to post by Arken

 

This open a very Big Questions on Manipulation Images that could come from NASA...... and how is easy to do that before show them publicly .

NASA makes the raw data publicly available; that is why the OP is able to make panoramas using his own software. NASA does not usually clone data; that is why there are sometimes black rectangles on stitched images. Private citizens, like the OP, sometimes do clone images, or make photo-montages. There is no reason why they should not, as they are interested in making pretty pictures rather than portraying visual information accurately.

Wrong. I don't mess with colors or lighting. I only stitch and if I DO change (or enhance) the colors, I will specify.

My thing is stitching images together so they look like they were taken on Mars, not in some studio.

How are some of our panoramas and montages inaccurately portrayed, unless they're stretched and skewed or stitched bad?



For instance - someone going all Hollywood on the landing video:



And here's my version - just the images sequenced into a film:



Those are the real colors and lighting on Mars (Mars gets about 1/2 of our sunlight, so it would be more dim there). The other video may look cool, but THAT'S inaccurate.

Or am I just not getting what you're saying?

reply to post by impaired

Or am I just not getting what you're saying?

You're not getting what I'm saying. It is perfectly alright for you to use cloning in making your panoramas. What you are attempting to do is create an artistic impression of what being on Mars would probably look like. Arken is claiming that NASA also uses that, and other, techniques to somehow falsify their data. They do not; they simply leave areas for which they have no information blank. He then claims that these blank areas represent "censorship," when, in fact, they are the result of the sort of scrupulous scientific integrity he accuses them of not having.

Originally posted by DJW001
reply to post by impaired

 

Or am I just not getting what you're saying?

You're not getting what I'm saying. It is perfectly alright for you to use cloning in making your panoramas. What you are attempting to do is create an artistic impression of what being on Mars would probably look like. Arken is claiming that NASA also uses that, and other, techniques to somehow falsify their data. They do not; they simply leave areas for which they have no information blank. He then claims that these blank areas represent "censorship," when, in fact, they are the result of the sort of scrupulous scientific integrity he accuses them of not having.

I gotcha.

Now, I wasn't insinuating that NASA uses the Content Aware feature, but I am saying that anything is possible. It just makes you wonder, but then again, why send a rover to Mars, make it public, but lie all the way through? That's the rational side of me arguing with the conspiracy side.

And I know what you mean about the missing data (black/white areas in images).

And I have to respectfully disagree with Arken. A lot of the things he points out are stitching errors and JPG artifacts.