Tatty Old Photos.

[CT]

I thought some of you may be interested in the photo restoration stuff I do.

I was asked to do this photo by a customer, his grandfather being one of the people in the photo.

I love this picture - these guys are obviously miners - one is holding a Davey lamp. The occasion of the photo is a mystery, my best guess is they were commencing the sinking of a mineshaft for a new colliery. Bad as the picture is, the only part that really concerned me was the one chap's badly damage shirt which was going to present a lot of work, being difficult to preserve any detail with all the damage in that area. I actually advised against having it done, but I was persuaded to do it and quoted the customer a very reasonable price provided he was in no hurry.It was a work in progess when he rang me and had decided he didn't want it doing as he thought it was too much!

Shame, as no doubt the picture will eventually disintegrate and be a total goner.

In contrast, this pic while looking hopeless, didn't present nearly so many problems and was quite do-able despite the ciustomer having been turned away by a pro lab.

It amazes me that people let precious photos get to the stage they do. This was the only picture this chap had of his father. :shock:

 

[silkstone]

Nice work! I think it's great fun doing a restoration job on pics like that. I've done a few for the (85 year old) father of a friend, who insists on keep old pics in his wallet so he can look at them and show them to people when he's out. :shock:

 

[Steep]

Forgive the sizes, this is my pet project, the handsome chap on the left is my great grandfather as an apprentice taxidermist shortly before he went off to the first world war (he survived). I come back to this image time and again as equipment and software improves.

 

[Matt]

Most impressive!

 

[CT]

Steep... that's good. pity about the fading right through the eyes of the chap at centre rear. You've done all the hard work - try masking round that faded eye area - feather the mask slightly - and reduce the gamma a little. You should be able to bring it up.

 

[Steep]

I'm not sure what that would be in my software CT, I don't use photoshop. I'll try masking the eyes and adjusting the levels, see if that brings them up a bit.

 

[CT]

I use PSP mostly. from the top drop-down menus it's...

Colours>>> Adjust>>>Gamma

 

[Steep]

Ah, I use Picture Publisher from Micrografx it has most of the tools that ps and psp have but usually under different names.

 

[silkstone]

In PSP and some other applications, using the histogram adjustment function and moving the slider to the left is the same as adjusting the gamma. :wink: