Shaikh Muqbil: How Is the Head to Be Cut Off from a Picture?

Question:

The ḥadīth: “The [prohibited] image is only the head, so when the head has been cut off, there is no [remaining prohibition in the] image.” So how is the cutting of the image to be done?

Answer:

The blotting out [of the picture] comes about as in the [authentic] ḥadīth: that it take the form of a tree, [that] it not be like an image of a person. So one blots it out and draws lines on it until it takes the form of a tree.

Source:
http://www.muqbel.net/fatwa.php?fatwa_id=1760

N.B.: Title mine (Trans.).