Am i missing something

[alanH2o]

hiya folks

Long time lurker and relatively new to photoshop here. attached is just one of many pics of me when i was younger, which i am attempting to archive and repair before they get damaged beyond repair.
The picture was ripped, creased, faded covered in spots etc.

what i want is a set of fresh eyes, think i cant see the wood for the tress. things like: does the grass behind the person on the left look too dark compared to the rest or any pointers to improve it would be greatly appreciated

sorry mods if this should have gone in the image help forum

ps i am scanning the photos with a canon 4400f at actual size and 600dpi is this ok

thanks alan

[TommyO]

Alan,
Normally if I have many images to archive, I don't try to restore each perfectly. In fact, perfection is often an endless endeavor. If you are just archiving and have many more to do, I would move on. If not, and the image is one you really want to restore, print and show off, then yes it could stand some slight adjustments. Overall, it is very close. I would just tweak some of the contrast on individual elements using masking... bring our eyes to those things more important, the people.

Scanning at 600 should be fine. Any more and you get a lot of dust and scratches you have to edit out. Any less than 300 and you'll wish you had scanned higher ten years from now. Also, be sure never to save over the original thinking what you have done is good enough. I have done that before only to wish I hadn't years later (especially after I got better at it.)

Best of luck with those and post some more.

[learninlady]

I agree. I keep three folders. original/working/complete. I take the photos from the original and copy them to the working and only work in the working folder, I ignore the original unless I need reference.
And I make sure I keep all of them separate, as there have been times I delete the working and begin anew.
I tried to work on the photo you posted and although I did get it a bit sharper, its still very blurry.

[Southbay]

I think burning the grass was fine — helps the crowd stand out. Sounds like you already put a lot of work into it, and tho the grass may be a bit dark on the left, like TommyO says, maybe move on.

It hasn't been mentioned, but I sure hope you're scanning and editing in TIFF format. As well, unless you're planning to make prints which are a great deal larger than your originals, 600 ppi is plenty for photo scanning. There's not a lot of information to be gained beyond 300, actually.

As most photofinishers print in the 300-400 ppi range, my rule of thumb for the scanning I do for customers is: 300 ppi for prints 4 x 6 to 12 x 17, 600 ppi for anything smaller than 4 x 6. This yields 6MB TIFF/2MB Jpeg at 300 ppi and 23MB TIFF/ 4MB Jpeg at 600 ppi, for scanned 4 x 6's.

Either of these resolution will provide a decent file for onsceen viewing.

Digital storage is getting ever cheaper, so for quality archiving that you're doing for yourself, you might as well go TIFF at 600 ppi. You can always re-save them as Jpegs, even cut them right down to the exact pixel dimensions (640x480, 800x600), etc. for a digital frame. Puts your entire life on a thumbdrive!

Have fun with it.

SB

[alanH2o]

Thanks,
the site has been a great source of help to me, i have found the answer to pretty much all the problems i have had.
Great tip about using 3 folders which i am pleased to say i had already picked up. i know the images are soft but blame my dad for a cheap camera and even smaller prints lol
All my files are saved has psd atm and only converted to jpg for specific purposes. hard drive space been so cheap and dvd discs even cheaper. i always try to have at least two copies of everything, losing a lot of importent things early on taught me that
heres one i did last night, turning into an insomniac thinking i will just do a little more, not sharpened this btw, my thinking it being easier to sharpen later when i know what i am going to do with it.