Bad Newspaper Print Scans

[phyllis]

Hi, I'm new here. I was wondering if anyone had any suggestions for how I might go ahead improving these scans. These are from a newspaper. I have high-resolution versions, but of course they're just big dots. Any recommendations for something I might try in Photoshop? I can't really blur them much without losing what little detail there is. Any suggestions?

http://phyllis.fellowshipx.org/OldPix/photo1.jpg
http://phyllis.fellowshipx.org/OldPix/photo2.jpg

Any suggestions are appreciated! This is not something I've had much call to do before.

Thanks, Phyllis

[phyllis]

Or would it help to send the photo somewhere with a high-end scanner? (I'm just using a desktop scanner here.) Or aren't there firms that do photo restoration? (Would they work with something like these?)

Any thoughts appreciated!

[Photo678]

rescan with descreen

[Doug Nelson]

I occasionally have good luck with Photoshop box blur. But it's a blunt instrument, no fractional pixels, so the original resolution has to be just right for it to be most effective.

[phyllis]

Well that helped some, so thanks! Are there places that would be capable of doing a better restoration of these than what I can do with a desktop scanner?

Thanks, Phyllis

[punkjumper]

I ran the median filter, then USM a touch. photo 2 doesn't look all that good though

[phyllis]

Okay tried the box blur. Too blurry I'm afraid. Any ideas on whether some kind of firm out there could do something with these? Thanks for all the help! :-)

[phyllis]

Median filter helped! Thanks!

[Kraellin]

1. duplicate background.

2. digital camera noise removal, fairly strong.

3. median filter (to taste)

4. usm 4/100/5

5. clarify at 6.

this is far from a finished restore, but does get rid of the dots and cleans up the image a bit.

[zekeode]

FFT filter
Noise removal
Adding noise

[Michel B]

Originally Posted by zekeode

FFT filter
Noise removal
Adding noise

Good workflow and result! Suggestion: masking edges for the noise?

[phyllis]

Nice! Wait, what's the FFT filter?

[zekeode]

http://retouchpro.com/tutorials/?m=show&id=185 FFT Filter

Michel B: I don't know anything about masking edges.

[phyllis]

Awesome, thanks!

[Michel B]

Originally Posted by zekeode

http://retouchpro.com/tutorials/?m=show&id=185 FFT Filter

Michel B: I don't know anything about masking edges.

Masking edges is more common for sharpening techniques. Depending on your software, you want to select the edges as if you drew a pencil drawing on the edges, and used this drawing as a mask to avoid adding noise on thoses edges, while maintaining the texture given to the rest of the picture. One way to do this is to use the Filter/stylize/find edges. The result is best with a slight gaussian blur. The Filter/adjustments/threshold enables you to adjust the thickness of the drawing. If you use the result as a mask before applying noise, the edges will be exempt from noise. There are other ways based on highpass sharpening or minimum/maximum filters, and certainly others I don't know... I am sure others can point you to useful tutorials.