Defringing a B&W Photo

[kitjv]

Lightroom Version Number

Lightroom Classic version 9.2

Operating System

1. macOS 10.15 Catalina

I have several old B&W images that have considerable fringing along the edges. Is there a way to eliminate this using Lightroom 9? Thank you so much!

 

[Rob_Cullen]

I am curious to follow your question!
Are these "images" scans or camera copies of original B&W paper prints?
Are they imported (color) photos that have been edited as B&W in the Develop module?
Are you seeing 'white' or 'colored' fringing edges?
Have you considered that it might be over-sharpening?

Defringe becomes available in the Lens Correction panel when you select [Manual] where the dropper can select a color to defringe.

 

[kitjv]

These are old archival images I downloaded from the internet. Sveeral were taken 50 years ago. So the original quality is questionable at best. The fringing is "white". Over sharpening is not an issue unless, of course, they were sharpened at the time of capture. Defringing via the Lens Correction panel is ineffective.

 

[Rob_Cullen]

I do not think that Lightroom will be able to do anything for this.
As you found- Defringe does not do it.
I tried a Brush with Auto-Mask turned on, but it seems that the brush will not recognize 'white' as a tone to be able to edit the fringing.
Ask your question in the Photoshop forum as there is sure to be a Photoshop guru that would have a Photoshop answer.
You might consider the 'white' fringing to be the same as 'Halos' along tone edges. Have a look at this site for a method in Photoshop that uses a clone stamp brush that is set to only 'clone' nearby tones to white areas.
https://www.photocascadia.com/easil...A-KjOh4g2bnzyRMfegPDZloOb1eyP5-WYmwxEKoyvdJGA

 

[kitjv]

Thank you for your response. I suspected that LR might not be able to deal with this. But, truth be known, the fringing issue is really not critical for my purposes. Nevertheless, I will take a look at the site you suggested. Thanks again.

 

[Paul_DS256]

This is likely just one aspect of restoration. You may want to Google "restoring old scanned B&W photos" to get some ideas of technique and tricks.

 

[kitjv]

Thank you!