No People in the Photo and Still No AI
Friday 11 July 2025, 16:32 by Nando Harmsen | 2,228 views | 4 commentsThis article was translated from Dutch with the help of AI. Read the original.
Are you at a public location? There are always people walking through your frame.
If you don't want people in the shot, you can use all kinds of AI tricks. Or you can use the old-fashioned method of taking multiple exposures.
I was in Iceland at a well-known black church on the beach. As with so many popular locations, it was busy with tourists.
If you don't want people in the photo, that becomes a challenge. The least inspiring way is to remove them with AI tricks.
It can also be done differently, the old-fashioned way.
You can wait until everyone is out of the frame, but that can be difficult and time-consuming. It might not even work.
Do you have a tripod with you? Then you can use multiple exposures. You take one photo with people in one position, and another with people in a different position. You then combine these in Photoshop, using a mask to hide the people.
I think this is a neater way than using AI. With AI, the people are replaced by a piece of the surroundings invented by software. This can lead to strange results and things that don't exist.
There are also situations where the technique of taking multiple shots doesn't work. Especially when it is very busy. But in that case, it might be better to accept the crowds as something that characterises the surroundings.
Or you can go back when there won't be anyone there.
In Iceland, that can be in the middle of the night during summer, because it never gets dark.
About the author
Nando Harmsen has been photographing for more than 40 years. He specialises in wedding photography and landscape photography. Nando also gives talks, workshops, masterclasses and photo trips, and regularly reviews new and interesting equipment.
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4 comments
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Walter wrote on Tuesday 15 July 2025 at 11:46 | replyTekstueel, er kwam geen AI aan te pas.
This comment was written in another language and has not been translated yet.
Ik mis de optie lange sluitertijd met grijsfilter?
Ik heb eerder een ander "probleem", geen mensen waar mijn opdrachtgever wel mensen in beeld wil
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Nando
wrote on Tuesday 15 July 2025 at 16:14
| reply
Inderdaad. Die optie is er ook.
This comment was written in another language and has not been translated yet.
Die optie werkt echter niet altijd, want soms blijven mensen gewoon te lang op een plek stil staan. Of door de lange sluitertijd komen wolken bewogen op de foto, of water. Dat is niet altijd de wens. -
PvRFotografie
wrote on Wednesday 16 July 2025 at 15:08
| reply
Wat ook kan in plaats van maskeren is de foto's als lagen importeren, een smart object maken en dan via Layer->Smart objects->Stack mode en dan kiezen voor 'Median' Photoshop verwijderd op die manier alle ongewenste personen. Wat weer handig kan zijn als je veel meer mensen in de foto's hebt.
This comment was written in another language and has not been translated yet. -
P. Kooijman wrote on Wednesday 16 July 2025 at 19:13 | replyik zou ook kiezen voor lange sluitertijd met grijsfilter. Als je tenminste een statief bij je hebt.
This comment was written in another language and has not been translated yet.
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