Help! Repair/Restoring Slide Image

[Buckeyekid]

Good Evening to all the good folks here at RP!

I have a daunting task ahead of me and am looking for a good starting point!

I am fairly new to restoring/correcting photos (other than the "quick fixes" located in my camera software!) but my daughter gave me a copy of PS Elements 6 for Christmas to help me with along my long road ahead. Over the past few weeks I have been scanning all of the photo's and slides that my Grandparents had in their home. A lot of them were just piled in old boxes but it included several hundred 35mm slides. After contacting several photo print shops inquiring about converting the slides to digital images I purchased a very nice Epson Photo/Negative Scanner (under $150 vs .50 per slide!) and began the task of scanning each and every photo and slide. My goal was to correct/restore the pictures that needed it and make a slide show DVD for my grandparents for Christmas. This task was cut short when my grandfather passed away on Dec 12.

I have been reading a lot of the posts here, watching a lot of tutorials online, purchased "Photoshop Elements 6 for Dummies" and just kinda muddling through several photos.

One of the major problems that I am having with the several of the slides is sever fading, I'm not quite sure how to proceed with these.

I am attaching one of the "worst" that I'm dealing with.... any and all suggestions are welcome! Up to this point I have been playing with different levels and have had some pretty good results! A lot of these slides were taken during a trip from Ohio to AZ in 1963 (Most of them taken at the Grand Canyon) so quite a few of them have the sky's blown out in them!

Thanks for your time and consideration!
Sherry

[staceya88]

Hello, Im new on here, great site when i was working for a photo lab i did the photo restores on some on the photo's here is what i have done.
Fixed colour removed dust and scratches, im sure you could do more but this was a 5min job. Im not sure how to attach image if you could tell me how ill upload image. Good luck

[staceya88]

haha had to go to advance, remember 5min job. but shows you an idea on what happens when colour fix and heal brush does.. Stacey

[Buckeyekid]

Thanks Stacy! That looks better than what I started with! Actually the photo that I uploaded had a few adjustments to it before I could even see the content of the slide (just adjusted the contrast when I scanned it!) I'm thinking of rescanning it with out any adjustments and see what I can do!

Like I said I'm really new at this and am just getting started on repairing some of these old ones.

Here is one that I did earlier (it was in much better shape than the one I posted!) this was just a color correction and fixing the color casting!

Sherry

[staceya88]

Practice makes perfect, I started knowing nothing and my knowledge is so much better now, i got photoshop CS4 for Christmas
In that photo there was a slight blue tinge to it, i removed that by colour correction and also removed the major dust and scratches in the photo.

But other wise that is great work
What program are you using to fix the images??

If you would like some more help etc or an image done i would be more than happy to do that.
Stacey

[chillin]

I think a little warmer colors could help.

[Buckeyekid]

Thanks Chillin and Stacy! The after picture of the little girl (me!) was just a quick fix with Photoshop Elements 6 (I only did the color cast correction nothing else). Here is a copy of the same picture with a little more work. I applied a warming filter, adjusted the H/S a little, used a 22px clone (set at 80% opacity) to correct the dust/scratches on the walls, and then used a 6px clone (in lighten mode at 75% opacity) to cover a blue blotch right under my chin.

Like I said in my first post, this program is very new to me and I'm still working my way around how to use the layer thingy! I know that there is a way to isolate specific areas on a picture to adjust only that area (ie: dark shadows around eye's and such) but I have quite figured it out yet!

Sherry

[James Penner]

If you haven't tried it already, try using the Multiply blending mode. If you're dealing with images that are over exposed or faded it can help to build up image density.

[Buckeyekid]

Thanks for the tip J.P! I will give that a try and see how I can work it into my damaged images! I have been reading through a lot of the message board traffic and looking into the video tutorials, I have almost every problem that has been posted here in one or more of the images I have!

It will be a long and tedious journey! I'm so glad I've found this forum!

Sherry

[gordonb]

Sherry,

Welcome to Retouch Pro. I'm a newb to this site as well though I have been using Elements with an Epson Scanner for a few years now. Here are some thoughts gained after scanning 1400+ slides:

• Think about a file naming structure (e.g. Scan_20090105_001.tiff) and using directories to separate subjects.
• Tag things in the organizer as you go. I use People, Places, Events, Dates as categories & tags (Mike, Washington, Birthday, 2001)
• Back things up.
• Use "Professional Mode" in Epson Scan. Starting with a good scan leads to better results in PhotoShop.
• Turn off all adjustments (i.e. "Descreening", "Color Restoration", "Backlight Correction", "Dust Removal" & Digital ICE") - These things can be done much better in Elements. You might want to leave "UnSharp Mark" enabled & set to "Low" or "Medium" as I find the scans very soft otherwise.
• If the preview shows a strong color cast then use the "Histogram Adjustment" button to set the levels. For each of the red, green and blue channels move the black & white triangles to the edge of the "hump". In most cases this will eliminate or at least greatly reduce the color cast.
• Save as a TIFF file rather than a JPEG
• Scan in High Bit Mode (i.e. using 48-bit color rather than 24-bit color).
• Open the file in Elements and adjust for tone & Contrast (i.e. use the "Levels" control under the "Adjust Lighting" Submenu of the "Enhance" Menu or "Ctrl + L") then convert back to 8-bit mode (Using the "8-bits/Channel" option on the "Mode" submenu of the "Image" Menu).

Mat Koslowski has a not too bad book on using elements for restoration but Katrin Eismann's book is the bible though it is oriented towards the professional using the full version of PhotoShop.

Good luck and remember, take your time & always work on a copy rather than the original.

[Buckeyekid]

Thanks for the tip gordonb! I started scanning in JPEG (only cause I didn't know any better!) till I had a conversation with one of my co-workers who does this kind of thing as a second job and he gave me some of the same tips!

I do have several that I need to rescan and I will use the tips you provided and see if it helps!

Sherry

[Veer]

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[Kraellin]

Veer, welcome to RP.

please do not post unrelated advertising in this forum. if you wish to advertise here, please use the 'Classifieds' forum. future posts of this kind will simply be deleted as spam.

[gordonb]

Originally Posted by Buckeyekid

Thanks for the tip gordonb! I started scanning in JPEG (only cause I didn't know any better!) till I had a conversation with one of my co-workers who does this kind of thing as a second job and he gave me some of the same tips!

I do have several that I need to rescan and I will use the tips you provided and see if it helps!

Sherry

Sherry,

It can seem daunting some days. A huge stack of old slides and photo albums but you will be amazed how picking away at it slowly will create a wonderful Family Archive. My father passed away in 2004 and I missed the opportunity to go through his families albums and have him explain who these people were. Luckily he left a fairly complete genealogy and I've been fortunate finding little tidbits here and there (I love people who write on the back of photographs :-) ) and correlating these disparate findings.

Now I'm up to almost 2000 images from the 1860s through the 1980s. My siblings are getting trained to keep an eye out for old pictures and pass them on to me. Being slightly Obsessive/Compulsive (OCD) helps ;-) (well at least I wash my hands a lot :-0 ). I'm now pushing the limits of Elements on a regular basis which is a sign I'll have to bite the bullet and upgrade to the full version of PhotoShop.

A few further points to help your sanity:

• Devise a folder structure. I use a base folder called "Master" then under that is a series of folders by decade (i.e. 188X, 193X, ...) and under those folders for specific years as they become known.
• Devise a naming structure. I use Scan_192X_001.tif, Neg_1954_03.tif or Slide_1963_27.tif for scanned photos, negatives & slides respectively. Usually you can accurately guess the decade from the clothing, hairstyles and ages of the subjects so most images start out in the "decade" folder with an "X" in the filename and as I can identify the specific year the "X" is replaced and the file is moved to a year sub folder. Once you have the year don't forget to use <CTRL>+J to change the date on the image.
• As I retouch an image I use Elements naming structure for the working file (i.e. Scan_192X_001_edited-1.tif) and they are saved in "Version Sets" with the original. The final retouched image is the only one I keep (If one is ever done tweaking an image) deleting all intermediate backups and then the final version is used to generate JPEGs at resolutions appropriate for web display or print as appropriate.
• Figure out how to store your originals. I use the original carousels for slides, binder pages from Print File for my negatives and archival file folders with unbuffered interleaving tissue for prints. All are cross-referenced to the filenames.
• Dust and dirt are your enemies. Find a place to buy several cans of "Dust Off" and several pairs of white cotton lint free gloves. Starting with less dust on a scan is easier than fixing it in photoshop.
• and most importantly ... Have fun!

Regards,

Bruce

[Lars Bell]

Originally Posted by gordonb

[*]Turn off all adjustments (i.e. "Descreening", "Color Restoration", "Backlight Correction", "Dust Removal" & Digital ICE") - These things can be done much better in Elements.

I agree with everything about that statement except for "Turning off digital ICE." ICE is both a hardware and software solution. ICE does not work with everything (especially B&W), so you may not want it on for those reasons. But it can't be done later with software only. If you want automatic dust removal than leave ICE on (unless it creates artifacts or other problems).

Of course you can always go through and remove each dust particle in PS or elements later. But if ICE works for the particular image you might as well let it do the heavy lifting.

Lars
owner - http://www.slidescanningpros.com

[gordonb]

Originally Posted by Lars Bell

I agree with everything about that statement except for "Turning off digital ICE." ICE is both a hardware and software solution. ICE does not work with everything (especially B&W), so you may not want it on for those reasons. But it can't be done later with software only. If you want automatic dust removal than leave ICE on (unless it creates artifacts or other problems).

Of course you can always go through and remove each dust particle in PS or elements later. But if ICE works for the particular image you might as well let it do the heavy lifting.

Lars
owner - http://www.slidescanningpros.com

Have you ever tried not using ICE? IMHO ICE creates more artifacts than it corrects, takes way too long and I've never met anything that couldn't be better done by a human taking care using PS.

Bruce

[Lars Bell]

Hi,

Yes, I've done just about every combination possible. Sometimes ICE works great, sometimes not so great. It just depends on the situation and the film type. I don't think a blanket statement like "never use" or "always use" can be applied to ICE.

My only point is that it is the one option that can not be done later, because of the hardware side of that technology.

Lars
owner - http://www.slidescanningpros.com