Old, badly damaged photo

[Kraellin]

you're welcome, beth. library of congress, ok. thanks

well, you guys are going to force me to look again on this legs/pants business...

[Kraellin]

well, i've got to stick with my original notion. it's legs, no pants, no leggings, no tights, just legs.

attached is how i see it. the black is the legs in outline. the green is the background tween her legs and the red seems to be a mold stain or something similar, which, granted, makes it look like her leg there is too fat to be a leg. there is also a shadow or stain coming down through that mold stain that is throwing things a bit oddly as well. but i see legs.

i would suggest that using a blend mode duplicated over a couple of times is doing something odd. try using just a brightness/contrast layer.

but, i never write this stuff in concrete. if you see pants, by all means, do it as pants. that's part of being a restorer.

[solitear]

Craig..... I think I'm back with you..... I enlarged her legs 3x and what looked like a fabric fold on HER right leg looks more like a shadow from the chair... and I think what looks like the pants cuff flipping up a little on HER left leg, may be a faded spot on the photograph ...... (this is starting to sound like an explanation of the 'grassy knoll' senario or Seinfield's 'magic luggie' ....)

This is so much fun...... the initial reason I thought/think they were legs is because of the context....Barring an accident, why would she be wearing long pants, that didn't match, underneath her dress...... they're awfully snug.... toddlers usually have that penguin pants look with the crotch near their knees....

I have revised my earlier post to reflect my latest beliefs......

Beth

[nomi]

Ok, do I know how to get a debate started or what?

This is fun. I'm attaching what could be one interpretation of the image. I thought I had decided it was pants but, after reading everyone else's posts, I'm not 100% positive. I'm only 99% sure now. I've marked what could be her pants in red and what could be her socks in blue. To me this is a reasonable explanation of why her right leg looks twisted to me, especially if you look at what could be the cuff of her right "pant" leg. It is angled wrong for it to be the cuff of her sock, it may be that her pants have a little cuff at the bottom.

Beth, great background (100 times better than mine) and great job restoring.

Nomi

[Kraellin]

beth, i'm tempted to keep the discussion going just to see more of your inserts the last one was precious you've a delightful sense of humor and wit and a nice command of vocabulary and trivia... 'retoucher's hippocratic oath', 'dem pants', 'moppet' (boy, havent heard that one in a long time), quotes from phyllis diller (who used to attend our church, or so i'm told), 'the grassy knoll', seinfeld (though, i dont recall that one), 'penguin pants' (lol)... delightful thank you

but i'm all done. i've found over the years, that you can smash someone in the face with a waffle iron and they'll swear it was a toaster, even though every time they look in a mirror they see a waffle pattern. and i've also found that folks do see different things. always surprises me a bit, but doesnt make their viewpoint any less valid than mine. it's sort of like one of those puzzle things where you look at it and see one thing, but if you look at it slightly differently, you see something else. so, stay true to yourselves and happy holidays

[solitear]

Awe Craig...... Puuuuurrrrrrrr........ ha! Phyllis Diller used to go to your church..... man, I would have gotten there early every Sunday just to sit by her...... I'd have been escorted out though 'cause there is nothing funnier than giggling in church...... my husband still gives me 'the look' ..... but this last episode had me doubled over laughing my guts out.....

You know how they list the order of service in the bulletin and, in our church anyway, when someone is going to sing a special song, the title of the song is printed on the left side of the page with leading decimals across to the name of the person singing it.....

Well, a couple of weeks ago our bulletin read:

"Who Killed Jesus"............. Doris Clark



oxoxo
Beth

[Kraellin]

beth,

my mother was the one that said that phyllis went to our church. i never met her, so must have been before my time. but i dont know about sitting next to her; i can imagine the little whispers about this or that would probably have gotten me banned as well

ah! so doris did it! i'd always wondered about those judas stories. boy, talk about your grassy knoll

[solitear]

Craig..... yep................. it was Doris .......... hehehe

oxoxo
Beth

[Evelyn]

hello boys and girls...... I am sorry, but your leg theory does not hold up My pants where not edited besides her left leg, but your legs are. You had to make them look like legs whils mine where pants all along.. I have to laugh though..... i wish the owner of the pic would come in and say something.... well never mind, pants or legs, in the end it does not matter. Those repairs are all damn good. I wish i had more time ATM so i could do a little more.

take care

Evelyn

[lurch]

I don't recall that little girls of that era even wore pants, let alone under a dress. Just a thought . . .

[Atom Kat]

Ok, I'm sorry to butt in, but I have to post regarding the legs....

Hey there RetouchPro people, long time reader, first time (in a very long while) poster.

This picture appears to be of a toddler, around 12-18 months in age. Babies of this age are often very very chubby, hence the tree trunk legs. Her head is around a fifth of the size of her body length which supports the above age and the shadows on her legs are from the room lighting and the furniture that it appears that she is holding onto.

And I have to agree strongly with Kraellin, and their demonstration of the leg line.
You HAVE to follow the sock line and discount the light area between her legs. Even pants that are short enough to show her socks wouldn't cause her socks to cut into her leg like that. The knees are chubby as heck - see the above comment about baby fat and the fat that babies have - and then lastly I will reinforce Lurch's brilliant point that young girls in this era (or girls of any age mind you) never wore pants under dresses or skirts. This is pre 1950's, not 1982.

It is incredibly important for a restoration artist to understand basic biology and how it relates to subject age, and basic history and how it might relate to the way a period dress.

So no pants. Especially in a portrait.