When I try to edit photos in the photos app of my naturist pictures to remove blemishes a pop up says safe filter applied and the area is blurred but with huge pixels. I’ve tried turning off the relevant security features but to no avail.
is there any way to disable this annoying feature?
i didn’t have this issue before updating to latest version.
[Re-Titled by Moderator]
iPad Air, iPadOS 18
There is none. Safety Filter is something applied by the included (free) Photos app and that app is written by Apple. They'll need to develop a less sensitive filter.
Until they choose to, your best option would be to use photo editor from a less stodgy company that allows edits deemed "unsafe".
There is none. Safety Filter is something applied by the included (free) Photos app and that app is written by Apple. They'll need to develop a less sensitive filter.
Until they choose to, your best option would be to use photo editor from a less stodgy company that allows edits deemed "unsafe".
Alright, I have a workaround!
It trades efficiency for effectiveness, but it's being consistent for my edits so far and gets the job done like the suddenly defunct retouch tool. (Apple, put it back!)
Why this works:
Although this isn't explicitly an Apple Intelligence tool it is absolutely utilizing AI to identify the contents of the photo as a whole before determining if your action will result in a retouch, a redact, or a safety filter being applied.
*By removing the surrounding context (i.e. zooming in until the "unsafe" imagery is no longer referenced within the frame), the tool can proceed with the intended retouch action.
After a week of nonsense I was about to downgrade my macOS because of this stupid Clean Up feature, so I have my last minute desperation to thank. LOL I hope this helps!
[Edited by Moderator]
I followed RK9design after Cleanup began adding pixels to EVERYTHING in sight -- including Instagram next-image arrows. We're talking fashion runway images. These two images shows in my comments were shot by Torso for the Winter 2024 issue of Dazed Magazine.
RK9design's instructions were:
1.Select photo
2.Enter 'Edit' mode
3.Choose the 'Crop' tab
4.Zoom in to the area you want to touch up*
5.Choose the 'Clean Up' tab
6.Remove what you need to with the tool
7.Repeat steps 3-6 until all areas are touched up
8.Choose the 'Crop' tab
9.Zoom out to the full image
Following 3, I got rid of her face and head and proceeded through the cycle. But I never saved or stopped. Just exported, cleaning up about 10 images by advancing to next image w/laptop arrow. All worked perfectly and the images now had faces. This image -- which AI previously pixelated to death -- was fine.
THEN, I did save everything and uploaded the Dazed cover below, which would have had a burka thrown over it -- forget pixels -- an hour ago. I did not follow the RK9design but returned to the old way.
I successfully removed little dots in her hair and had no problems. Working in her hair, I felt AI had to see her face and the entire image, and would it decide she was also too racy? After all, it bounced out pigtails in the first image. No problems.
So I'm not saying my own Photo app is now good to go -- because Apple knows I went to Canva to get images corrected and then said "try again" with Mac, came here and followed RK9design's work-around.
I am saying that I was able to batch RK9design's solve at minor inconvenience to myself. And the edited images are in my folders, even though I didn't hit save until the end. And this new Dazed cover photo was no problem, even though the pigtails in coat image totally sent AI Cleanup into a naughty-girl frenzy and it began pixelating even advance arrows.
RK9's point was that context matters, hence the crop head-fake, and I agree. But I did follow the normal process with this cover below, so maybe it 'learned' something about my images. Who knows.
Is Apple Using Google AI on images?
I'm involved with this same issue on Pinterest -- including with their legal dept -- because I do not post adult images. And they are listening to me and agree that their Google AI is going wild. Also Pinterest legalize states that the suggestion of 'adult' is enough to get the image banned.
I've been on the platform since 2007 with 5 takedown requests in 17 years. All of a sudden, boom. I'm getting one a week. And you don't get to see the image.
I'm in a good place with Pinterest because I went to their legal dept for help -- not a fight. They have not removed any images in four months -- although the issue remains open while all is being sorted out.
Can we expect this challenge of 'adult' to get worse, given our politics? Yes. But for now I'm optimistic that I've got some equilibrium with Mac Photo Cleanup. It if all blows up in my face, I'll be back to share the details.
Hi, If you’re still looking for advice or for a solution for editing your photos but you’re getting the “pixel effect” it’s because the Apple added a new “safety feature” in an iOS update.
My guess is Apple doesn’t want their customers to use their technology for “nude photography” or for “photographs detected as nude”.
So there is no advice and there is no solution. The only solution is to use a different photo editing tool or app. I’m sorry, I hope this helps…I wish I had a better answer.
***If you wanted to you could try some of the different “work arounds” posted on here…but for the most part they’re probably not going to work***
The only work around I have found that works is by cropping prior to editing:
Crop the area concerned tightly enough such that the pixelating doesn’t appear. Edit as required then open up the crop to view the rest of the photo and ‘finish’.
I’ve found that by first editing the photo and using the markup function to “cover-up” the item in question, saving the photo, and then go back and try the clean-up function again, it pretty much works around the safety filter issue
Use a free third party editing app and you’ll be fine.
top0 wrote:
I got safety filter applied when removing a 5-gallon water bucket sitting next to a dog. The crop / re-crop strategy worked but frankly the safety filter clearly doesn’t. There are “walled garden” “nanny-ware” criticisms of Apple’s operating systems and software I think are overblown or silly but this is grotesque and incompetent.
Apple doesn't read here in this user-to-user forum for feedback or suggestions. You can, however, let them know your thoughts here:
Snapseed is probably the most popular free editor.
use Touch Retouch app. it also works as extension, and it’s better than apple intelligence in removing unwanted things from your photos. and it works in any iPhone.
As a work-around: Try to take photos of people in Portrait Mode on your iPhone or iPad. The depth control may help to smooth blemishes on the faces without needing the Retouche tool.
On the Mac it will help a bit to zoom in as far as possible when retouching a face. Then we can remove small blemishes without triggering the pixellation to make the face blurry.
Use Apple Intelligence in Photos on iPhone - Apple Support (BW)
Since I can’t delete this post… I’m just going to say this.
There is No solution to the pixel issue.
Apple doesn’t want their technology used for what AI or (Apple Intelligence) has deemed “nefarious” or “nudity” or “illegal” I don’t like it, but it is what it is.
I called AppleCare and it is definitely an AI issue, 15.1, although not officially a Beta version, it is. Turned AI off and Photos did not revert back to Retouch so that was not written into macOS when toggling between turning AI on and off. At this time, appears there is no way to turn Safety Filter Applied off unless Sequoia is reloaded and AI is not turned on, and that is my guess.
The way one person who deals with photography for a living explained it was that Apple is worried that their clean up tool would be used to "clean up" more than just random water bottles and back ground tourists. He then downloaded a picture from Facebook (totally random one) and was able to remove enough to make clothing look "skimpy" - although it had tended towards that to begin with.
He also showed EXIF data was modified to indicate the photo was edited with Apple Clean Up but I can see what Apple is scared of. I'm not supporting Apple's aggressive safety filter, necessarily but given how skittish they are with stuff like this, it may be best to simply opt for a third party editor.
People should also remember - anything posted online is gonna be fair game, like it or not. There are even ways to pull instagram pictures - even when you don't have an account yourself. We need to take our own privacy more seriously and stop relying on corporations like Apple.
I tried this on the iPad and it doesn’t work. As soon as you open the photo the filter is selected so when zooming then editing it still pixelates.
ive stoped using the photos app and use another.
come on apple please get this resolved
i just want the option to either blur or pixilated. It should be my choice not yours.
How to disable filters while editing pictures in Photos?
