RetouchPRO member KentC, an Internet chum, pointed me to this thread at DPReview, where a pretty nifty restoration method was suggested and improved upon (by Kent, himself).

Take a look...

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1006&message=17739647

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~Danny~

I dunno if it is just too late for me to think clearly, or what, but Danny, if you know what he is talking about with the dupe later change blend to difference and then change it to darken after you nudge it? For some reason that does not make sense to me at all. Can you give me a better description of this process, I am so glad to have found something that works that well and easily for this. Have a pic right in front of me that needs it BAD - lol.

Dawn

Thank you so much for the link Danny!!! :bigthmb:

I have often used this technique and it can really work small wonders!
Actually, sometimes I use it together with the Dust/Scratches or Motion Blur Filters ...

Dawn,

The steps described at DPReview are a variation of the 'basic technique' which you can find very clearly explained in this Tutorial (http://retouchpro.com/tutorials/?m=show&id=52).

Hope this helps ....

Forget about the difference blend mode--he was just doing that so he could see the cracks appear when he nudges the new layer.

-Dup the original.
-Set the blend mode to darken.
-Select the move tool.
-Click once in the image (to give it focus).
-Hit the UP-arrow key (this is what he means by nudging it up one pixel).
-Ctrl-alt-shift-E to stamp the whole thing to a new layer
-Set the blend mode to darken.
-Select the move tool.
-Click once in the image (to give it focus again).
-Hit the RIGHT-arrow key (this is what he means by nudging it up one pixel).
-Ctrl-alt-shift-E to stamp the whole thing to a new layer
....

See the pattern?

Bart

It's a very clever idea, although in the process of removing the cracks, it shrinks the sizes of light-colored features and expands the sizes of dark-colored features. Eg., the girl's shoulder strap shrunk noticeably.

Bart

This looks like a great method for repairing certain images. I've had a couple of pictures where I should have done something like this and saved many hours of extra work.

Jon.