Fix for badly damaged images

[arcadhia]

I would like to heard your valuable suggestions for this pictures?
In the first I'm just trying to save the 3 persons in the first row...
on the 2nd... ??? full restoration I think

Thanks for your advise and let me tell you that RetouchPro is my favorite forum although maybe I had the lowest record on replies...

[Xaran]

Could you tell us what software you are using?

Christine

[Flora]

Originally Posted by arcadhia

I would like to heard your valuable suggestions for this pictures?
In the first I'm just trying to save the 3 persons in the first row...
on the 2nd... ??? full restoration I think

Hi archadia,

I had a go at your second picture (the girl) .. worked on her face only ...

I changed to CMYK and used Apply Image to remove the strong yellow stains ... (I tweaked the Magenta Channel to get it closer to the Yellow before using it as source to correct it, then I used the Cyan channel to correct the Magenta).

Change back to RGB.

Dust&Scratches to remove the smaller spots.

After that I created blank Layers (settings: Lighten, Darken, Soft Light, Overlay) to selectively correct/enhance different parts of the girl's face ...

Neat Image to clean up the noise a bit

USM to improve contrast and sharpness...

For the group picture I strongly doubt you'll be able to reconstruct the faces of the two people in second row .... The red Channel is the one where you can see a bit more details ... but even tweaking it in different ways I was never able to really make out their features enough to work on them .... (Attachment 2)

I think that with a lot of patience you could rescue the three persons in the first row by cropping the picture (easy part ... ) ... then reconstructing the missing parts ....

Originally Posted by arcadhia

Thanks for your advise and let me tell you that RetouchPro is my favorite forum although maybe I had the lowest record on replies...

...Are we still your "favorite forum" ? ....

Take care...

[krishna]

I used the red channel, which I found to be cleaner. Applied Enhance Contrast comman in ImageJ, in small measures (I don't remember the settings). Opened the picture again in Photoshop and applied healing brush and dodge and burn tool. Did not try to smoothen the face to attain the texture as I felt that it might affect the features. While attempting to fill the spots I tried the Maximum and Minimum filter, as suitable, and found it quite suitable, though some minimal amount of doctoring will have to be done. Selected the dark/bright pixels alone and applied the Max/Min filter. The used the dodge/burn tool over them. Found it better than the clone stamp tool (at least in this case).

--
Krishna

[Gary Richardson]

Sorry Arcadhia,

meant to get back to you on this one, but got distracted. Had a go with your second image.

Desaturated image.
Created new layer and cloned out major blemishes. Flattened image.
Duplicated layer, applied Polaroid Dust & Scratches filter set to Dark dust, applied layer mask and painted out blemishes using soft white brush. Flattened image.
Duplicte layer and apply Polaroid again set for Light Dust.
Adjust levels.
Apply Neat Image.
Paint in catchlights to eyes (new layer, soft white brush, adj layer opacity)

Am currently looking at other image, looks like it needs substantial re-build, so will probably take some time, get back to you if I get anywhere with it.

Ooops sorry, forgot, I added a sepia tone to image as well.