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Wire Worm

This little plugin will help you remove wires and other unwanted objects from your images. There are, of course, other tools to achieve this goal, e.g. the good old clone stamp or the healing brush, besides a number of dedicated plugins and applications (see below). However, Wire Worm comes with a set of features that I have not seen elsewhere:

specific tool designed for easy selection of long thin objects, e.g. wires
advanced color matching for seamless patches without color bleeding
ability to finetune patch after placement
unlimited undo/redo

I found each of these features vital for both an efficient workflow and a high quality result. You are invited to download Wire Worm for free and try it yourself. You may also want to watch the online basic tutorial or the color matching tutorial to get the idea. The New Features Demo shows some of the features added since the release of the first two online videos.

Here is a screenshot of the Wire Worm plugin:

Wire Worm GUI

History of Changes

Version 6.4 (64 bit version)

Compatible with 64 bit hosts
Same feature set as the 32 bit version 6.2

Version 6.2 (latest 32 bit version)

Help button and tooltip option
Minor bugfixes

Version 6.1

Fixed selection marking color

Version 6.0

Support for 16-bit/channel images
Support for grayscale images
Support for small (800x600) screens

Version 5.9

Support for left-handed mouse settings

Version 5.8

Snap function: semi-automatcal selection of best matching patch
mMinor bugfixes

Version 5.7

Magnifying Glass, very handy for inspection and fine tuning
Nicer Arrow buttons with auto repeat
Additional keyboard shortcuts
CTRL key modifier
Minor bugfixes

Version 5.6

Navigator thumbnail image for easier scrolling
Antialias option for smoother selection boundaries
Minor bugfixes

Version 5.5

Faster undo/redo/fine-positioning
Faster Capture Range slider response
Radius slider also acts on last patch
Keyboard shortcuts (arrow keys etc.)
Use mouse wheel to modify selection radius

Version 5.3

Improved color matching

Version 5.2

First published release

Awards

Wire Worm has been rated as excellent by Freeware.de.

Rating by Freeware.de

Downloads

Choose your version:

Wire Worm 32 bit version
Wire Worm 64 bit version

If you are not sure which version you need, check your host installation path. Below is an example for Photoshop CS4 in an English localization.

32 bit host: C:/Program Files (x86)/Adobe/Adobe Photoshop CS4/Photoshop.exe.
64 bit host: C:/Program Files/Adobe/Adobe Photoshop CS4 (64 Bit)/Photoshop.exe

Demos

Be sure to watch the online tutorials:
Basic Tutorial
Color Matching Tutorial
New Features Demo

Examples

Below are some examples of images processed with Wire Worm. Hover the mouse over them to see the effect.

For more examples please visit the Wire Worm User Gallery.

Related Stuff

The Photoshop Clone Stamp and Healing Brush tools are popular and easy to use, however there is no control over the patch source location on a per patch basis. This is OK for uniform or random pattern backgrounds but may be a problem when removing objetcs from a structured background, e.g. lines crossing at an angle. The Healing Brush is prone to color bleeding.

Wire Pilot is a commercial plugin which performs well on uniform backgrounds, e.g. blue sky. A manual "Smart Patch" tool is available for complex backgrounds. Wire Pilot inspired me a lot! Unfortunately, you can only apply circular patches, which is not optimum for wire removal. Also, color matching is sometimes less than perfect.

Retouch Pilot is an extension of Wire Pilot. It offers an automatic patch selection function which, however, is somewhat slowish on my PC.

Image Mender is an affordable inpainting application where the user simply marks the unwanted region in an image. The program then automatically patches the marked region. In most cases the result is surprisingly good, but sometimes Image Mender "guesses wrong".

MSU Image Restoration is a free (noncommercial use) inpainting application.

Inpaint is a commercial inpainting application for object removal. The selection is made with a freehand tool - not suited for wire removal.

Photo Wipe is a free inpainting application based on diffusion. This method works well on backgrounds without much texture.