Hello,
I use the modality theme in one of my sites (www.myanalyticsdoctor.com). I removed the “image placeholder” in the search results by the following method: after creating a child theme, I modified post-formats.php by deleting this code:
else{ ?>
<div class="image-holder">
<div class="thumb-wrapper imgLiquidFill imgLiquid">
<img class="attachment-full wp-post-image rs-slide-image" width="1024" height="500" alt="slide" src="<?php echo get_template_directory_uri() ?>/images/assets/slide.jpg">
</div>
</div>
<?php
}