Physical (not digital) Solutions to Restoring

[Kraellin]

jaxk's recent posts on oxidation of silvering in photos and how to clean it up, inspired this thread. i'd like a place here for posting physical solutions to cleaning up damaged photos and images. this is as opposed to digital means like photoshop and paintshop pro. i feel that some photos and perhaps documents and other items, might best be handled first by physical cleanings and treatments.

it's true that we deal mostly with digital solutions here in RP, but we are primarily concerned with solutions as a whole. and, it's probably quite true that an object that can be cleaned up first physically, is easier to then clean up digitally, if necessary.

so, this is the place for it. post your physical solutions to cleaning and restoring here. this is NOT a discussion thread, with the one exception being if you KNOW something that is posted here DOES NOT work, then please post that also. just list the solution, what do you do to physically handle water damage; what do you do to physically handle stains, tears, folds, rips, wrinkles, mud, dirt and dust? how do you remove a photo that is stuck to glass or stuck in one of those 'magnetic' photo albums? this is also NOT a question thread. for questions, post a new thread in the regular area.

in other words, i'd like this to be a 'faq' for physical treatments to restoring, whether it's documents, photos, canvas or whatever. you may also include physical treatments to preservation. let's build up a reservoir of information that people can find and use on physical restoration. a LOT of time can be saved in the digital handling if a physical handling is possible first.

[mistermonday]

Craig, great idea.

For Slides and Negatives: Light dirt, water stains, finger prints
Use Isopropanol (Isopropyl Alcohol)- must be greater than 90%. You can find 99% Isopropanol at most pharmacies. Make sure it is not rubbing alcohol which is only 70%. Most commercial film cleaning solutions are just Isopropanol packaged in pretty looking dark bottles with flashy labels.
Best is to dip and let the film air dry. If you must use a cloth, make sure it is lint free and soft.

For loose dust on negatives and slides, compressed air is the best. Not the stuff in a can that has trichloroethane but plain air from a compressor (60 - 80 PSI). Ideally the hose should have an in-line filter to prevent any moisture from getting on the film.

Regards,
Murray

[jaxk]

Greasy marks on prints and documents.
Light grease on surface -normal fingermarks for example, can be removed with a 'Putty rubber'[eraser for over there ;-) ]obtainable from art supplies stores.
A good alternative is plain flour dough -a small amount of flour with water mixed into a malleable dough.
Simply gently rub over the mark[s]

Heavier marks-
Oil and grease that has soaked into the 'fabric' of the substrate .
Place a tissue over the marked place, over that heavy craft paper[brown wrapping paper] and warm through with an iron at a low -rayon/nylon setting
You are attermpting to lift the grease back up into the tissue.

[Kraellin]

skipc
Member Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: KY Bluegrass
Posts: 77

ball point pen gone wild

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i've never had one this bad. are there any suggestions for a reasonably fast method to remove the ball point damage?

This question was asked in this thread: http://www.retouchpro.com/forums/147932-post17.html and this answer was posed:

yuccaview
Junior Member Join Date: Nov 2005
Posts: 5

Re: ball point pen gone wild

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Get yourself some"Bestine" ( rubber cement thinner) and a Qtip try a corner.
This usually works, so does lighter fluid with a Qtip just be VERY careful!!!
Both of these are dangerous but either will usually work.
Don

[veera]

HI frineds i am veera form inda i ahve lot of doubt about retuoching lod images any help me how to woke that images


veera

[saby]

here is a link of sds (http://www.sds-prepress.de/) what products i use to remove dust from slides, and somewhere there is an ultrasonic cleaner you can find a lot search by google here is one (http://www.hilsonic.co.uk/Benchtop%2...my%20Range.htm)

saby

[Kraellin]

here's one for removing mold: http://www.retouchpro.com/forums/pho...-solution.html

[resto]

Does anyone know of any info out there on photo working before the days Photoshop?
Like when people hand painted and used chemicals.

I’ve read bits and pieces here and there and it was really interesting. But I’ve gone through pages of google and can only find info of digital photo stuff.

I wanted to read some stories of old time photo colors, editors and stuff like that.

[Kraellin]

try adding 'conservator' or 'historical' or even 'old' to your keywords when searching.

also, check sites like the smithsonian or the national archives.

[Yochanan]

Originally Posted by resto

Does anyone know of any info out there on photo working before the days Photoshop?
Like when people hand painted and used chemicals.

I’ve read bits and pieces here and there and it was really interesting. But I’ve gone through pages of google and can only find info of digital photo stuff.

I wanted to read some stories of old time photo colors, editors and stuff like that.

Hi resto,
I'm new here but have been in photography since about 1958 (in Japan) where I learned how to roll my own film and develope and print my own photos, both b&w and color. The way we did it "back in the day" was we worked on the negative first, then sepia toned the photo and then used colored penciles to hand color & touch up the photos. We didn't get many really damaged photos back then because most people didn't want to pay the cost which was pretty heffty if you could find someone that was willing to try it.
The hardest part was getting the skin tones just right.

Hope that gives you a little idea of what it was like back then.

[ValerieWood]

Photo Restoration is very useful now a days, several walk-in establishments in malls offer this service in order to restore weather-beaten photographs into the same condition it was first taken. With the help of technology, digital photo restoration is made possible and restoring old photos is far more convenient compared to its non-digital counterpart.