Color change from being stuck to glass??

[dazzlement]

I'm having a hard time restoring this photo, it's not in good condition at all and they are wanting the grey color fixed on the man. It was stuck to the glass in the frame. It's a special favor for the lady I'm doing it for so I could really use some tips on fixing it. I tried to fix it but it's coming out too smooth and fake looking. Please help?? Thank you!

[iDad]

I tried the clone tool, seems to grab enough to save that image try duplicating the layer then put top layer in overlay mode >create a new blank layer and start grabbing your areas for cloning from the original and place on the new blank layer until you get it where you want it

[dazzlement]

Thanks so much, I'm not quite sure I had my layers right but it did work with the duplicate layer on overlay. Much better than what I was doing before. Thanks again!

[Tony W]

There is not a great deal of image or colour information left in the hair for the area stuck to the glass so had a play using Lab. It may be possible to duplicate this in RGB also.

If it is of any help:
1. Mask stain in the L channel and apply curve to balance contrast and density as close as possible to the undamaged area
2. Use patch or clone tool to disguise/blend edges where mask meets good info.
3. Select a channel and apply surface blur after darkening the stain area
4. Select b channel and do the same
5 New layer set to Color sample good skin tone on the man and paint over face stained area as required
6. Hair required a little masking to change color balance and contrast with a curves layer.
7. Patch tool for hiding glass edges.
8. Small boost to overall colour using a and b channels only

Still plenty of clean up work and overall and local colour could be improved but doable with a little more time spent.

[mistermonday]

Tony, really nice job!
Regards, Murray

[dazzlement]

Oh wow, that's awesome! A lot better than my second one even. Only problem is I was only given a certain amount of time to do it. I will try that though!

[Tony W]

Thank you Murray your comment much appreciated

dazzlement, glad you found it useful. I would not be too concerned about the time to do this - although you will probably have a much larger image with better information to work with I imagine that you should get to this stage in 30 minutes or so. After this then it is a question of how much added clean up you will need to undertake

[dazzlement]

thanks so much again. I haven't used masking in forever so it would probably take me a lot longer than the average person lol. I haven't even done restoration in a while so I've got some more things to learn.

[Gary]

I set color samplers in the unaffected areas of his skin and used those RGB values and curves adjustment layers to match the colors. With a hide-all mask and a soft, low opacity white brush, the curves effects were selectively applied. Same with curves adjustments, dodge/burn and skin texture.
To make life that much easier, I strongly recommend that you get comfortable with masking.





Cheers!