BEFORE- I picked a tough one. That's my Grandma and Grandpa. Not only is this one damaged and aged in the sun so very discoloured, but it was originally printed on that awful pimple paper that was popular in the 60s and 70s, which makes retouching super hard. Also the colour is so out of whack I have no idea what it used to look like, except for some fuzzy childhood memories of this pic sitting on Grandpa's desk.
The last five-ish years and counting, my Dad and my brother ( 
Part of that process has been selling the house and moving Grandpa into assisted living, and more recently a dementia care facility.
As everyone knows, this is a sad, exhausting, emotionally taxing process. However, there has been an upside I have found.
When packing things up, we stumble across memories. Lots of photo albums, framed photos, mementos, posters, etc. I was the first grandchild to a wealthy Grandpa so there are some VERY large commissioned drawings of me as a 4 year old as well 😂 I have found joy and laughter and tears and memories and new insights in finding all these things. I love learning about my family. It's fascinating.
At the dayjob I just quit last month, I did a LOT of photo restoration. I have the bad shoulder and wrist to prove it (practice good ergonomics, everybody!). So I happily grabbed a few of the photos that have been sitting in Grandpa's office for God knows how long, fading in the sunlight, with the intention of scanning and fixing them up and sending digital copies to family members.
So here is the first in a series I am thinking of sharing. Restoring photos is tedious but super fun and satisfying, especially when you know the people in the photo.
I don't claim to be an absolute expert at this, but I'm pretty good. Check it out:
AFTER- I think I could tinker with the colour on this forever. I ended up settling on trying to manually balance it to look a bit like a Hawaiian sunset (as I'm pretty sure that's where they took this) and then put a bit of a Kodachrome filter over top (as I'm pretty sure that's what they mainly shot). It's not perfect, I don't think it ever will be, but I'm much happier with it now.
Do you have old photos that need restoring? Have you ever tried doing it yourself? Were you happy with the result?
Until next time!
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Peace & Love
