Is There Any Practical Way to Restore This Photo?

While that image is painstaking to repair, the clone tool and healing brush will be welcomed friends. But there are a group of folks who do this sort of thing for sport over at Retouchpro.com. In addition to any commentary you get here, that would be an excellent place to post your image and ask for advice.

On Wed, 22 Nov 2006 20:59:02 -0800, wrote:

While that image is painstaking to repair, the clone tool and healing brush will be welcomed friends. But there are a group of folks who do this sort of thing for sport over at Retouchpro.com. In addition to any commentary you get here, that would be an excellent place to post your image and ask for advice.

Thanks. I check over there. Yes, I have lots of hours with the clone tool but I can’t face the amount of work this one would take cloning each spot.

So your question should be "Is there a quick way …" and, as Tony says, there isn’t.

But It’s a very rewarding exercise if you have the patience.

wrote in message

On Wed, 22 Nov 2006 20:59:02 -0800, wrote:

While that image is painstaking to repair, the clone tool and healing brush will be welcomed friends. But there are a group of

folks who do this sort of thing for sport over at Retouchpro.com. In addition to any commentary you get here, that would be an
excellent place to post your image and ask for advice.

Thanks. I check over there. Yes, I have lots of hours with the clone tool but I can’t face the amount of work this one would take cloning each spot.

I’ve seen far worse. The trick is to divide the image into sections, do just 1 or 2 a day. It’ll be done before you know it.

May I suggest Katrin Eismann’s book on retouching and restoring photographs. <http://www.digitalretouch.org/>

Restoring this pic will take time, but Katrin does offer some shortcuts.

scb

No quick way, as noted already. If I were to do this, I think I’d turn it into a hobby and using guides "cut" it up into pieces and just concentrate on one area at a time.

Bob

Just do it slowly over time, like a year long hobby. If it is an important image then it would be worth the time.

Robert

have lots of hours with the clone tool

If you’re in version 7 or later, look into the healing brush and patch tool.

If you embark on this venture there is one word that is key to avoiding time-consuming mistakes:

L A Y E R S

A good trick is to use the Clone Tool in Lighten / Darken mode.

But make a very large scan to begin with. I would do 1200 ppi.

Rob

On Wed, 22 Nov 2006 20:31:09 -0800, wrote:

I’ve restored a few hundred old faded, creased, torn, stained, etc. pictures. An acquaintance said he had a picture he’d carried in his wallet for many years because he treasured it, but over time it had deteriated and he wondered if I could restore it. I said I’d give it a try. That was before I saw it. Here it is:

http://tinyurl.com/y9exd3

I’ve never tried to fix anything like this, and have no idea how to approach it. The problem, of course, is the bits of that have flaked away throughout the image. If you blow this image up there are more tiny pieces missing than is apparent in this jpeg I made for viewing.

I’ve read all the other responses to your post, and I agree with them…..to a point. Yes, you can restore this photo, but keep in mind that all of the areas that need to be cloned in, will not look natural. If you only had to clone in a few areas, you could make it look natural, but with that much damage to the original photo, trying to clone in the missing parts could make the photo look unnatural. I say this because I have worked on many photos that were badly damaged (I just finished doing several for my mom’s boss), and while you can make it look much better, there is a point to how much better you can make it look.
An example was a picture my mother sent me of my grandmother. It was a very old picture, and had a lot of cracks in it. The cracks were from the type of paper the photo was printed on. Apparently the paper developed cracks in it as it aged.
I tried to rebuild the picture to make it look natural, but after spending 8 hours just on one arm in the photo, I realized that it was a lost cause. Trying to clone in parts of one arm so as to eliminate the cracks, made the photo look weird…as if there was something wrong with the arm. I had to tell my mother that is wasn’t rebuildable.(turns out my uncle had the original negative of the picture, so I used that to make a good copy.)
What I’m getting at is that there is only so much you can do to rebuild a picture, and when you have to go to extremes to do a rebuild, the end result may not be what you were hoping for. I’m not trying to discourage you here, I just want you to know that not all damaged photos can be rebuilt. I have been pleasantly surprised to do a rebuild that looked impossible, but turned out very well, so you never know.
If you should decide to do a rebuild on that photo, I wish you all the best and hope it turns out well. (it may, you never know until you try.<g>)

Talker

"Talker" wrote in message

On Wed, 22 Nov 2006 20:31:09 -0800, wrote:

I’ve restored a few hundred old faded, creased, torn, stained, etc. pictures. An acquaintance said he had a picture he’d carried in his wallet for many years because he treasured it, but over time it had deteriated and he wondered if I could restore it. I said I’d give it a try. That was before I saw it. Here it is:

http://tinyurl.com/y9exd3

I’ve never tried to fix anything like this, and have no idea how to approach it. The problem, of course, is the bits of that have flaked away throughout the image. If you blow this image up there are more tiny pieces missing than is apparent in this jpeg I made for viewing.

I’ve read all the other responses to your post, and I agree with them…..to a point. Yes, you can restore this photo, but keep in mind that all of the areas that need to be cloned in, will not look natural. If you only had to clone in a few areas, you could make it look natural, but with that much damage to the original photo, trying to clone in the missing parts could make the photo look unnatural. I say this because I have worked on many photos that were badly damaged (I just finished doing several for my mom’s boss), and while you can make it look much better, there is a point to how much better you can make it look.
An example was a picture my mother sent me of my grandmother. It was a very old picture, and had a lot of cracks in it. The cracks were from the type of paper the photo was printed on. Apparently the paper developed cracks in it as it aged.
I tried to rebuild the picture to make it look natural, but after spending 8 hours just on one arm in the photo, I realized that it was a lost cause. Trying to clone in parts of one arm so as to eliminate the cracks, made the photo look weird…as if there was something wrong with the arm. I had to tell my mother that is wasn’t rebuildable.(turns out my uncle had the original negative of the picture, so I used that to make a good copy.)
What I’m getting at is that there is only so much you can do to rebuild a picture, and when you have to go to extremes to do a rebuild, the end result may not be what you were hoping for. I’m not trying to discourage you here, I just want you to know that not all damaged photos can be rebuilt. I have been pleasantly surprised to do a rebuild that looked impossible, but turned out very well, so you never know.
If you should decide to do a rebuild on that photo, I wish you all the best and hope it turns out well. (it may, you never know until you try.<g>)

Talker,

They can’t see your posts, they are in the adobeforum, not this NG. I agree that not all damaged photos can be restored to their original condition, but they can be made to look a lot better than the way they do at present. I have copied limbs, flipped them over, modified the lighting to get them to match their surroundings, transformed and warped them and even used bits from other photos in repairs. The two links are to the first ever photo I tried to restore (the reason I started to use PS)and at the time I was quite pleased with the result. One day I will go back into them and do a proper job.

Regards

Mike H

before
http://www.pixentral.com/show.php?picture=17E9YCq5LYaIAR8IDT Hua6hfbePuX

After
http://www.pixentral.com/show.php?picture=1kF62u5YX1U9EeIrmW xgYeE7zngmd0

"Talker" wrote in message

On Wed, 22 Nov 2006 20:31:09 -0800, wrote:

I’ve restored a few hundred old faded, creased, torn, stained, etc. pictures. An acquaintance said he had a picture he’d carried in his wallet for many years because he treasured it, but over time it had deteriated and he wondered if I could restore it. I said I’d give it a try. That was before I saw it. Here it is:

http://tinyurl.com/y9exd3

I’ve never tried to fix anything like this, and have no idea how to approach it. The problem, of course, is the bits of that have flaked away throughout the image. If you blow this image up there are more tiny pieces missing than is apparent in this jpeg I made for viewing.

I’ve read all the other responses to your post, and I agree with them…..to a point. Yes, you can restore this photo, but keep in mind that all of the areas that need to be cloned in, will not look natural. If you only had to clone in a few areas, you could make it look natural, but with that much damage to the original photo, trying to clone in the missing parts could make the photo look unnatural. I say this because I have worked on many photos that were badly damaged (I just finished doing several for my mom’s boss), and while you can make it look much better, there is a point to how much better you can make it look.
An example was a picture my mother sent me of my grandmother. It was a very old picture, and had a lot of cracks in it. The cracks were from the type of paper the photo was printed on. Apparently the paper developed cracks in it as it aged.
I tried to rebuild the picture to make it look natural, but after spending 8 hours just on one arm in the photo, I realized that it was a lost cause. Trying to clone in parts of one arm so as to eliminate the cracks, made the photo look weird…as if there was something wrong with the arm. I had to tell my mother that is wasn’t rebuildable.(turns out my uncle had the original negative of the picture, so I used that to make a good copy.)
What I’m getting at is that there is only so much you can do to rebuild a picture, and when you have to go to extremes to do a rebuild, the end result may not be what you were hoping for. I’m not trying to discourage you here, I just want you to know that not all damaged photos can be rebuilt. I have been pleasantly surprised to do a rebuild that looked impossible, but turned out very well, so you never know.
If you should decide to do a rebuild on that photo, I wish you all the best and hope it turns out well. (it may, you never know until you try.<g>)

Talker

The link is to a repair from Katrin Eismann’s Restoration & Retouching book, http://www.pixentral.com/show.php?picture=1fmOCGEVIJ7JiqzlQU eiiv88TdYUR

very similar to the original OP’s problem.

MH

On Thu, 23 Nov 2006 04:54:10 -0800, wrote:

May I suggest Katrin Eismann’s book on retouching and restoring photographs. <http://www.digitalretouch.org/>

Restoring this pic will take time, but Katrin does offer some shortcuts.

Yes, thanks. I have her book.

Now he tells us!

The key here is to concentrate on careful corrections where it matters most. Faces and the clothing nearby is the most important. If your client can see these features free of the cracks, he will be delighted.

As for the surrounding areas, you might consider making a careful selection of the key elements, invert the selection and use a combination of Dust and Scratches, Blur, even the Median tool. Along with judicious cloning, you will be amazed at what can be accomplished this way. I have even made small selections on, say, the pants, and used these tools there.

I also feel you should generate a complete rectangle to size, and fill in the rounded off corner. It’s not to difficult to do so. If you select the sky, you can use the Fill tool to clean up that portion,backing it up with a bit of gradient to lessen the deadly posterized look you get when using Fill.

Good luck!

Jim

Would love to play with that image. Any chance you could send or post a larger copy of it a higher resolution?

Bob Noyes
Digital Graffiti

On Thu, 23 Nov 2006 22:08:58 -0000, "Mike Hyndman" <tell me yours and I’ll send > wrote:

Talker,

They can’t see your posts, they are in the adobeforum, not this NG. I agree that not all damaged photos can be restored to their original condition, but they can be made to look a lot better than the way they do at present. I have copied limbs, flipped them over, modified the lighting to get them to match their surroundings, transformed and warped them and even used bits from other photos in repairs. The two links are to the first ever photo I tried to restore (the reason I started to use PS)and at the time I was quite pleased with the result. One day I will go back into them and do a proper job.

Regards

Mike H

before
http://www.pixentral.com/show.php?picture=17E9YCq5LYaIAR8IDT Hua6hfbePuX
After
http://www.pixentral.com/show.php?picture=1kF62u5YX1U9EeIrmW xgYeE7zngmd0

I didn’t realize that the original post was in another group. Agent usually notifies me when I respond to a post that was crossposted.
That’s an excellent job you did on that picture Mike! That’s the type of damage I usually try to restore also.
The picture of my grandmother had thousands of little cracks in it. Trying to clone from one place to another was nearly impossible because of the cracks.
That picture you pointed out of Katrin Eismann….well, that’s a rebuild I’d have never attempted! I can’t believe she attained such excellent results with such a damaged original….that’s amazing! I think I’ll have to get a copy of her book.<g> The way I look at it, if I can learn just one thing from a book, it’s worth the money, and looking at Katrin’s work, I think I can learn a lot! Thanks for mentioning the book.
It’s funny, but a lot of people that I have restored pictures for, think that I should do it for a living, but I tell them that I wouldn’t make much money at it. I’m a perfectionist, and I’ll spend many hours trying to get it right. If I charged by the hour, well, it would be too expensive, so instead, I just do it as a hobby.(Also, people can’t complain about the finished product when it’s free.<g>)

Talker

On Wed, 22 Nov 2006 20:31:09 -0800, wrote:

Thanks for all the comments and advice. Here’s my dirty and not-so-quick result without taking all the time needed to do it right:

reworked http://tinyurl.com/yjbduu

original http://tinyurl.com/y9exd3

"Talker" wrote in message

On Thu, 23 Nov 2006 22:08:58 -0000, "Mike Hyndman" <tell me yours and I’ll send > wrote:

Talker,

They can’t see your posts, they are in the adobeforum, not this NG. I agree that not all damaged photos can be restored to their original condition, but they can be made to look a lot better than the way they do at
present. I have copied limbs, flipped them over, modified the lighting to get them to match their surroundings, transformed and warped them and even used bits from other photos in repairs. The two links are to the first ever
photo I tried to restore (the reason I started to use PS)and at the time I was quite pleased with the result. One day I will go back into them and do a
proper job.

Regards

Mike H

before
http://www.pixentral.com/show.php?picture=17E9YCq5LYaIAR8IDT Hua6hfbePuX
After
http://www.pixentral.com/show.php?picture=1kF62u5YX1U9EeIrmW xgYeE7zngmd0

I didn’t realize that the original post was in another group. Agent usually notifies me when I respond to a post that was crossposted.
That’s an excellent job you did on that picture Mike! That’s the type of damage I usually try to restore also.
The picture of my grandmother had thousands of little cracks in it. Trying to clone from one place to another was nearly impossible because of the cracks.
That picture you pointed out of Katrin Eismann….well, that’s a rebuild I’d have never attempted! I can’t believe she attained such excellent results with such a damaged original….that’s amazing! I think I’ll have to get a copy of her book.<g> The way I look at it, if I can learn just one thing from a book, it’s worth the money, and looking at Katrin’s work, I think I can learn a lot! Thanks for mentioning the book.
It’s funny, but a lot of people that I have restored pictures for, think that I should do it for a living, but I tell them that I wouldn’t make much money at it. I’m a perfectionist, and I’ll spend many hours trying to get it right. If I charged by the hour, well, it would be too expensive, so instead, I just do it as a hobby.(Also, people can’t complain about the finished product when it’s free.<g>)

Talker.

Many thanks for your comments. I thought I could restore photos until I visited the site http://www.retouchpro.com, well worth a visit. The AF messages are not crossposts, they are only posted to the AF server, (a password is needed to connect to it which you specify when you register with them.
This NG goes through phases of downloading these posts, which usually stop after a few days, this time around they are "hanging around" longer than usual.

Regards

Mike H

Nice!

Now, Jim…

Could you post BIG versions of these? What were the original scan dimensions (expressed as x-pixels × y-pixels).

I’d like to see the work in better detail (as I’m sure others would).

On Sun, 26 Nov 2006 09:37:29 -0800, Phos….
wrote:

Now, Jim…

Could you post BIG versions of these? What were the original scan dimensions (expressed as x-pixels × y-pixels).

I’d like to see the work in better detail (as I’m sure others would).

The original scan was 1500 x 2700 pixels.

I’m reluctant to post the entire image but he’s a 100% crop from before and after. Actually I don’t think this is very good, but I wasn’t willing to spend the hours it would take to do a good job.

http://img278.imageshack.us/img278/2061/100cropck4.jpg

This image is also a test of one’s drawing/painting talents. Some areas will need to be recreated. The ground cover is flattened blades of grass. The retouched image should reproduce that look and not destroy that texture with careless cloning.

Don’t forget to add noise to retouched areas of flat tone (in the face for example). That’s why cloning on a layer (turn on ‘Sample all Layers’)is so important. You can then add appropriate noise to each retouched layer to blend it seamlessly with the surrounding area/noise.

Move around the image and retouch gradually. Don’t stay on one spot too long. You’ll see better what still needs to be done if you come back to it.

Retouching on layers allows you to turn them on/off to assess your results and erase areas that may need to be redone.

It sometimes helps to work with a layer in lighten or darken mode to lighten or darken similarly toned defects (ie: get rid of light specs on a darker background or visa-versa.)

Don’t forget about using a brush in airbrush mode. I find it often better than the clone tool in smooth areas such as skin. Use it in lighten or darken mode and don’t forget to add noise afterwards to hide your handiwork.

I assume you’re converting to grayscale before beginning the restoration job? You can always re-‘sepia tone’ it when you’re finished.

It’s a lot of work but I find it fun to restore images like this. It’s relaxing and the results can be pretty amazing. fwiw I used to do this by copying the original with a 4×5" camera -> make an 11×14" b/w print -> retouch by hand using brushes with spotting ink, bleach, gouache and /or airbrush and then re-copy the result on 4×5" -> make a small print (usually 5×7") on thick fibre based paper and then sepia tone that so it looked as good as new. Using Photoshop is obviously a LOT easier!! Work that previously took days now can be done in only a few hours. I could do your image in about 2 hours – maybe less – maybe more. There are a lot of shortcuts that come to mind only when one sees what needs to be done.

Russell

On Sun, 26 Nov 2006 17:11:24 -0000, "Mike Hyndman" <tell me yours and I’ll send > wrote:

Many thanks for your comments. I thought I could restore photos until I visited the site http://www.retouchpro.com, well worth a visit. The AF messages are not crossposts, they are only posted to the AF server, (a password is needed to connect to it which you specify when you register with them.
This NG goes through phases of downloading these posts, which usually stop after a few days, this time around they are "hanging around" longer than usual.

Regards

Mike H

I’ll have to check out that site, as it sounds like another place to obtain a lot of tips.
I sometimes check out Worth1000.com They have a lot of excellent tips there also.
I often wonder if any one person knows all the tools and functions in PhotoShop. I would think that it would be impossible.<g>

Talker

"Talker" wrote in message

On Sun, 26 Nov 2006 17:11:24 -0000, "Mike Hyndman" <tell me yours and I’ll send > wrote:

Many thanks for your comments. I thought I could restore photos until I visited the site http://www.retouchpro.com, well worth a visit. The AF messages are not crossposts, they are only posted to the AF server, (a password is needed to connect to it which you specify when you register with them.
This NG goes through phases of downloading these posts, which usually stop after a few days, this time around they are "hanging around" longer than usual.

Regards

Mike H

I’ll have to check out that site, as it sounds like another place to obtain a lot of tips.
I sometimes check out Worth1000.com They have a lot of excellent tips there also.
I often wonder if any one person knows all the tools and functions in PhotoShop. I would think that it would be impossible.<g>

Talker,

I know of Worth1000, a very inspirational site! I use their "Out of bounds" regularly.
Knowing all the tools and functions is not that difficult, it’s having the skill to get them to do what you want with them. Also, being able to look at an a image and seeing immediately what is wrong with it and knowing how to correct it.
Judging by some of the replies to the Adobeforum, there are quite a few people, who if they don’t know all there is to know yet, they are only a week away from doing so. 😉
The thing with PS is that there is always at least three different ways to do anything.

Regards

Mike H

Another recommendation…

Get a Wacom Tablet…it makes things so much easier…

On Sun, 26 Nov 2006 05:01:28 -0500, Talker wrote:

Hey Mike! I just wanted to thank you again for pointing out that link to Katrin Eismann’s book. I received it two days ago, and have been reading through it. An excellent resource, thanks again!

Talker

"Talker" wrote in message

On Sun, 26 Nov 2006 05:01:28 -0500, Talker wrote:

Hey Mike! I just wanted to thank you again for pointing out that link to Katrin Eismann’s book. I received it two days ago, and have been reading through it. An excellent resource, thanks again!

Talker,

You are most welcome. Check out a couple of movies of hers at http://www.photoworkshop.com/adobe/softwarecinema/index.html

Regards

Mike H