Ghostly image

[Caitlin]

Originally Posted by deadants

Getting away from the girls for a bit, is there any ideas on what that thing on the right in the background is?

You mean behind Joan? Looks like it might be a pile of towels/sheets/laundry? I wonder could they be outside on a veradah? (Just based on the plant in the other corner)

[deadants]

Towels and sheets would make sense. I think the objet on the left is some sort of table or trestle.
I don't know whether it's inside or outside, but the owner of the photo lives in England so if it's outside it would probably be mid summer. Living where I do, anything below 19 degrees C is nippy.

deadants

[Kraellin]

yup. this one is a toughy and definitely interested in seeing if a better scan will bring out more.

btw, i didnt even include the other view i thought maybe was there. in your reddish image you posted earlier, i could also see the girl in question with her head turned to her right, looking to our left, with her right hand up in front of her face.

yes, i just penciled in that outline to show what i thought i was seeing in the un-penciled image. it's just a rough sketch to guide you where to look in the other image.

no doubt, if we do get a better scan, we'll see the real image is the girl with her head underwater or something

oh, and what did you do to get that reddish image you did?

K.

[deadants]

Originally Posted by Kraellin

oh, and what did you do to get that reddish image you did?

All I did was select the rough outline of the girls and look at the levels histogram and just darkened the levels of the selection. Nothing fancy, just a quick highlight trick.

deadants

[Flora]

Hi,

deadants,

Welcome to RP!

Just to stir a bit more confusion , here is what I saw in your picture...
in my opinion the girls are in an outdoor tub (could be in some South Mediterranean country (or some exotic part of the world...). At the sides of the tub I made out only plants (some long leafed(? did I say that right?)) .... and I think that the 'feature between the girls' heads is an ornate outdoor wall water tap....

Muriel seems to concentrate on something hidden in the tub or to be sulking .... and, in my opinion, her arms are kept close to her body .... Joan seems to be holding one knee...

I strongly blurred some of the body parts to emphasize what I saw ...

[Kraellin]

plant to the left of muriel, yes. and to the left of that, a bench.

hadnt seen the faucet before, but yes, and in doing some work around that, i could even make out some writing above the spigot... 'LAGREB' ?? ... 'LARUL' ?? the manufacturer maybe?

plants on the right, yes. one is a daisy-like flower in full petal.

to the right and up from joan's head, i'm guessing not towels, but a cut rock face of some sort.

i concur on joan's knee now also and am abandoning the idea of a hacked photo...mostly

i cant quite buy the image of muriel yet. what i've been finding for myself is that i tend to use filters that enhance my first impression, thus backing up my own suspicions. i also think that too many filters and so on can give you just about anything. at one point i was seeing flowers growing up the side of the tub still, it's fascinating to see what everyone else is seeing that i didnt. i also get the impression i'm working with one of those images where if you look at it one way you see one thing, but look at it another and you see something else, like the old vase and the woman's head image.

i also did some google searching on that faucet to see if i could find anything that matched. no luck. couldnt find anything relevant on 'LaGreb', 'LaRul', or a few others either

ok, i'm pretty much spending too much time on this one gonna have to wait for a better image.

K.

[deadants]

Thanks Flora for the welcome to the forum. I have been meaning to join in since last year when I first registed on this forum, but I have just been to busy on the genealogy forum http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index...ard,298.0.html As I said in one of my first posts, these people are more interested in researcing their family history then learning how to use graphics software so that's what I have been doing, helping them with their old photos that they are finding from lost relatives etc.

Gee that strong blur gives a good idea of what is going on in that tub. She's probably looking for her rubber ducky I'm realy impessed by what you guys are coming up with, I have had to look at this from a whole different angle.

I can't seem to make out the writing on the spigot Kraellin. Could you attempt to highlite it so I can see what you mean. I think the broardleaf plant could possibly be an aspidestra, they were a popular Victorian indoor plant.

I have just sent the photos owner another email asking how the enlarged scan is going, so we will have to wait for the reply. Also I have put a link to this forum on The Rootschat forum so some of it's members who are just starting out in photoshop, can come and join in here. They will learn more from you guys than anything I can teach them.

deadants

[Flora]

You are most welcome deadants!

Glad you decided to join in, and what an interesting place is rootschat.com !!

Originally Posted by Kraellin

...i tend to use filters that enhance my first impression, thus backing up my own suspicions. i also think that too many filters and so on can give you just about anything...

I couldn't agree more .... I've seen it done a lot .... but that's not what I usually do ... I always tend to remain as close as possible to the original .... Given the terrible conditions of this particular image, I did partially 'overblur, but only what was there in first place ....

[Kraellin]

flora,

my apologies. i meant no accusation of anyone or their techniques, unless maybe of myself and when i said the thing about not being convinced of muriel, i simply meant of anyone's version, including my own. it's just too inconclusive yet.

deadants,

i had a pretty good render of the faucet, but killed the pic by mistake in an undo sequence. i'll try and get another. something about sharpen lightly, clarify, high contrast, despeckle, de-interlace, light median filter, light texture preserving smooth...or something like that i've done so many on this pic that i've lost track. i do have one saved that shows it a bit, but not as well as the one i killed. if i cant re-make a better, i'll post the lesser one.

and just as an aside, i was in the store today, Staples. they had photoshop cs...$649. tempting, but not yet

K.

[Kraellin]

ok, i did another one, deadants, and labeled it a bit. i also noticed that where i put the faucet and faucet label text, seems to be over yet another plant. i think that whole back area is a rock wall with garden on it, which would well fit the mediterranean theme we've assigned to this. i'm dying to see how wrong or right we've been on this

K.

p.s. looking at this again just after i posted this last pic, what i was calling a rock wall may well be a planter of some sort, or even a cistern? it seems to have more of a defined shape than just some cut rock.

[Duv]

While it could be outside as Flora suggests, it looks to me like it is in a strongly lit basement. To the left is some machining equipment, perhaps a lathe? There's nothing interfering with the bottom of the tub which suggests it's sitting on concrete. To the right and above the girls head looks like a classic Pot Bellied Stove. Or not.

Cheers
Dave

[deadants]

Hi Duv,
The pot belly stove sounds like a good possability. It makes sense to have a ready supply of hot water on the go.

I have just received the file from Joan in England and this is what she had to say.

It was very interesting to read the discussion on the other forum and it would be fun to see where it is taking them. It certainly is a very faded photo. Attached is a larger scan of the original, if you need a bigger please email.

The picture was taken after 1909 likely in Kent, England where the family was living. The two girls are the half-sisters of my great-grandmother and at the moment I don't see to have dates for them.

Looking forward to seeing what else everyone comes up with !

Thanks
Jessica

So mabe our mediterainan thought have just flown out the window.

Hopefully with the larger version we will see a bit more detail.

deadants

[Caitlin]

Originally Posted by deadants

Hopefully with the larger version we will see a bit more detail.

No attachment here? Will you be posting it?

[deadants]

Hi Caitlin, here it is

deadants
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v3.../TubKids-1.jpg

[Flora]

Kraellin,

no problem .... ... It's just that I feel very strongly about it .... Surely the fact that 'in real life' I am a professional translator, mainly of legal documents, and any kind of 'poetic license' is an absolute NO NO in my job, has greatly influenced my attitude ....

As for our 'Mediterranean' theory .... I fear it has been shattered by Jessica's informations about the probable location!!! ...

Dave,

Your 'Pot Bellied Stove' sounds like a very good possibility .... even though I can't really warm to the basement idea .... I don't know if at that time you could have 'strongly lit basements' .... but what really makes me doubt is the presence of plants and flowers .... Gosh .... this is really getting very interesting!!!! It feels to me like being on a forensic team ....

deadants,

....thank you so much for taking the time to keep us informed and for posting the larger scan ....