Ginter Family - Wordless Wednesday

Ginter Family in Bristol, Connecticut 1929 

Happy Wordless Wednesday!

Scrappy Gen

Let's Remember!

Photo Edits - Catherine Grace - Tear Repair and Spot Healing

Here is our starting image of Catherine with lighting and color adjustments:

Lightroom is always my starting tool for photo repair. I try to do as much as possible there and then, if necessary, move into Photoshop Elements for further editing. The Clone or Heal Brush included with Lightroom is quite effective with small damaged areas. Here is a closeup of one area that needs fixing:

With just a few clicks of the Clone Brush these small dots disappear:

Before cloning or healing a larger damaged area like the background, first I like to use the Adjustment Brush set to Clarity -100, which smooths out some of the funky marks and pixels. You might remember that one of the challenges with editing this photo is that it was scanned at a low resolution and is therefore a small file with pixels easily visible upon enlargement. 

Before Clarity Brush at -100

After Clarity Brush at -100

This shows the background before and after the clarity brush set to -100 has been applied.

Next I used the Clone/Heal brush on the background. 

Looking good! Here is the image with all of the healed areas marked.

Now onto the challenging tears. This tear I was able to fix with the Clone brush in Lightroom: 

The larger tear really needs Photoshop. You can see how it looks using the Lightroom Clone tool. To undo the changes, just select Ctrl Z for each change you want to delete. Then right click on the image and choose Edit in Photoshop, and then edit a copy with Lightroom Adjustments. 

Here the tear has been repaired with a similar tool in Photoshop called, you guessed it, the Clone Stamp.

In Photoshop I saved the image as a copy, then went back to Lightroom and opened the new image. Just three more steps; 1) smoothed the skin on Catherine's face, neck and arms with the Adjustment Brush, Clarity -50, 2) lifted the highlights in her hair and eyes with Adjustment Brush, Sharpness +35 and 3) applied a light vignette. 

Here are the final and original images:

Don't know why, but that crooked grin reminds me of someone else. I can't help but smile when I look at her. She was so young and pretty. Believe it or not, those are not blond highlights in her hair, but white. The story goes that her hair was completely white by the age of 25. I won't tell you who in the family has her genes. 

Hope that these photo repair steps were helpful. If you have any questions, just give me a shout.

Happy Friday!!!

Scrappy Gen

Let's Remember!

Photo Edits - Catherine Grace - Color and Lighting Adjustments

Digitally preserving valuable old photos gives me the opportunity to repair the damage that time, neglect and poor materials have caused. Yesterday, I showed you this fearless female, Bubba's mother. She deserves a little beauty treatment, don't you think?

My usual order of photo repair has me adjusting the color of the image last, but the hue of this photo is not doing Catherine any favors. Sallow, dark skin doesn't look good on anyone.

In Lightroom, I adjusted

the Temp slider to -14 

and the Tint to +26.

She is looking prettier already. 

Next I applied the Black and White High Contrast Lightroom Preset. What woman doesn't like highlights?

Her eyes are brighter and her hair is shiny, but she is a little washed out, so I lowered the exposure from +1.15 to +0.39. 

Just adjusting the color, contrast and lighting has made a huge difference in this image. I am happy with it for now. Next time, I will show you how I repaired all of the bumps, bruises and tears. 

This image file is small, so if you click on the image and enlarge it, you will see some pixelation. Not much can be done about that now. The quality of the image is as good as the scan. That is why it is important to be sure to begin the digital preservation process with a scan at a minimum 300dpi and save to Tiff format. 

Happy Thursday!

Scrappy Gen

Let's Remember!

Wordless Wednesday - Joe L Clift

Joe L. Clift, Age 3, Elkader, Iowa

Slide Scanning - FotoBridge - Getting them ready!

Do you feel like you are swimming in 35mm slides? Depending on how many you have, it can feel like drowning. Or it may just be that you have no idea what to do with them. Here is what M.J. brought back for me the other night: 

Not too overwhelming. This is just a tiny fraction of Bubba's slides, so if you are dealing with boxes and boxes, I feel your pain. My sister and I spent a long weekend viewing and sorting most of roughly 10,000 slides. These are the slides that were sorted into the 'pictures of Scrappy Gen' pile. There is also a baggie labeled 'Garden', which includes slides of Bubba and Grandma's magical, mystical backyard. Today I am packing all of these up to send to FotoBridge for scanning.

Packaging slides is a relatively easy process. The most difficult part was the counting. :) For each group of slides I counted them, counted them again and secured them in stacks with elastic bands. Fifty was the max I felt comfortable putting in one stack. Here are some of my stacks ready to be put in baggies and boxed: 

Because the slides were already sorted by year, I chose to package each year individually. FotoBridge will send them back in their original groupings if you indicate that you would like this done in the notes section of your order. 

Once your slides are packed, it's time to place your order. Be sure to take a look at the packages before you start choosing and packing your slides. Packages range from 250 to 10,000 slides.

My first order has 500 slides. I am upgrading to the 'Gold' package, slides scanned at 3000dpi instead of 2000, and am adding the TIFF files. Even with the TIFF option added, the service is still reasonable when you consider how much time I will save by not having to tinker with each slide. My package will then arrive with three formats; jpg, tiff and web ready, perfect for uploading to The Scrappy Genealogist. :) 

Time to go to the post office and send these babies off. 

Happy Sunny Thursday! 


Scrappy Gen
Let's Remember!

not so Wordless Wednesday - Mystery Slide

Do you need more motivation to get those slides scanned?

How about this mystery slide?*

Found with Bubba's Slides - January 2011

Let's say my sister and I never went through Bubba's slides. Pretend you are one of my great grandchildren and you find this slide. What would you think? Any clues?

Happy Snowy Wednesday from NH! 

Scrappy Gen

Let's Remember!

*Slide was not scanned by FotoBridge.

Wordless Wednesday - Zayde Shoer - What a handsome guy!

This gentleman may not have been as pretty as his future bride, Sarah, but he certainly was handsome. 

Possibly I am biased. This is a picture of M.J. at about the same age:

Do you see the resemblance?


Just remembered this is supposed to be a wordless post. Oops! Please forgive me. I'll be quiet now.


ScrappyGen

Wordless Wednesday - Bubbie Sarah, a Beautiful Young Woman

Cell Phone Photo by Cousin Judy Nov 2010 Original in Cousin Karen's Collection