Photo Restoration - - Okay....how about this question

Cincy Gal · #1 01-01-2005, 03:34 PM

I'm in the process of working on my family tree. I'm trying to include pictures of my ancestors' grave stones. This is fine for most born before 1820, however......

What I'm having problems with is the stones that have degraded over time and have had some or most of their information eroded away. I've taken digi pics of all that I can find so far. My questions is: is there a way to manipulate the photo to make the worn writing more readable? If not, I'll just have to do a rubbing of some of these stones......now, if I can only firgure out how to explain to passers-by just what it is I'm doing wrapping a tombstone in paper like a Xmas present!! LOL

Duv · #2 01-01-2005, 04:24 PM

It may be very possible to bring out the detail. Why not post your pics and see what we can do?

Cheers
Dave

Axleuk · #3 01-01-2005, 04:29 PM

The familty tree idea is very good, but sounds a bit morbid to me including pictures of the headstones, unless of course they are done artistically

I'm sure that Photoshop, or any other graphics package will be able to help you out.

Posting you images is a good i dea, so we can se exactly what you have to play with.

Cincy Gal · #4 01-01-2005, 04:51 PM

I've got Photoshop and PaintShop Pro.....just no patience today.

Actually, the pics of the gravestones are more for documentation purposes. It's a definate way of showing at least the year of birth and year of death. The morbid part was my husband and I searching for some of these older cemeteries over this past spring and summer! I never thought I'd hear my self say "Stop the car! There's a cemetery!!"

Axleuk · #5 01-01-2005, 05:09 PM

Oh my, if thats a typical example of one of the gravestones, you have your work cut out trying to salvage something, but saying that, it was Jesus himself that came here looking for ways in which to turn water into wine, and he left with a head full of ideas, so dont lose hope ( nor your hair ).

MaryLynn · #6 01-01-2005, 07:49 PM

Cincy Gal, welcome to RP! It's good to have another genealogist to trade info with.

I, too, would be interested in what people come up with to bring out the information on stones. I've learned a couple of tricks for taking better shots in the first place and have played with "fill flash" and levels to help improve my shots but it is really difficult to bring out "white on white".

Axleuk, I had that "morbid" feeling until I saw the gravestone of my great, great grandmother and realized that I was connected to that person. All of a sudden she was more than a name in a family tree; she began to take on personality. Now, if she would just tell me who her parents were, I'd be eternally grateful.

Cincy, I doubt you will get too many odd looks taking a rubbing and it would be an opportunity to educate others in how to extract the information without causing further damage to the stone. Good luck!

MaryLynn

Cincy Gal · #7 01-01-2005, 08:08 PM

I know what you mean about that feeling of connection, MaryLynn. I've found out that my family is a lot more interesting that I originally thought when I was a child. We'll have to trade "war stories" sometime.

Maybe you can share your photo tricks as well. I'll say PM me so we can keep this thread on subject......unless there are some other 'closet' geneaolgists out there who'd like to learn too.

Ed_L · #8 01-01-2005, 08:26 PM

Welcome aboard Cincy Gal. No guarantee, but if you load your pic into Photoshop (don't resample), then check the different channels in all modes, you should see the channel that has the best possibility. Using that channel, greatly increase the contrast with curves. Zoom in until it would be hard to read, then back away from the monitor, maybe 10 feet or so. This sometimes helps when trying to read something like this. If you get a chance to visit the cemetery again, try to get strong sidelighting on the stone. That might help enough so you can more easily read the inscription. I was lucky when I visited the gravesite of my g-grandparents. The monument was as easy to read as a new one! I expected to find something like you did. Good luck.

Ed

MaryLynn · #9 01-01-2005, 08:43 PM

We have a few genealogists on here who would probably give us their input or benefit from our experiences. If we keep to the subject of getting good shots and editing, I think we'll have no problem with sharing other tidbits as well. PM would be great, too.

I'm attaching a shot of my great grandfather's stone. Problem here is that it is north-facing and nearly always in the shade. My first attempts at this were very dark and unreadable. Since the grave is in Idaho and I live over 300 miles away, waiting for just the right light is not an option. I was trying to think of some way to "shed some light" on the gravestone when I spotted the reflective sunshield in the trunk of my car. Holding the shield at the right angle reflected light onto the face of the stone and I was able to get a much better shot.

I'm still learning about spot metering with my camera. This would be another way to improve your shot.

Duv · #10 01-01-2005, 09:34 PM

Hi MaryLynn

Still working on Cincy's post but I think I see born June 20, 1834 died July 15, 1909 on yours. What did you come up with?

Cheers
Dave

MaryLynn · #11 01-02-2005, 12:59 AM

Hi, Dave, well done. Family tradition gives the birthdate as June 26, 1836. All census records from 1850 through 1900 support the 1836 birth year. We have to realize that gravestone information is only as reliable as the person who gave it.

The 36 is somewhat obliterated by the moss. Did you also catch the spelling of the surname as Stowe? Again the moss is in the way of the last letter.

Beyond the problem of reading what is on the stone is getting a good printed image. Documentation is very important and a gravestone can serve as proof of death when other records are unavailable.

MaryLynn

Duv · #12 01-02-2005, 09:00 AM

Hi MaryLynn

The 4 could definetly be a 6. The slant is similar. It may be just the angle the shot was taken but it doesn't look like the name is centred on the gravestone. Having said that if the last name is centred below the first, it would support a spelling of Stow. In any case, I've circled what possibly might be an E. Not sure if anyone can bring out any more detail. Also I noticed a Silas Solomon Stowe born in Illinois circa 1831. Any relation that you know?

Cheers
Dave

MaryLynn · #13 01-02-2005, 11:35 AM

Dave, good point about the centering of the names on the stone. I have visited the stone and the final e on Stowe is more easily read in person. A piece of information not available from just reading the stone is that he used the middle initial A. Imagine the A being under the moss and the names are still centered.

This raises a question I'll have to research further. Since the stone encompasses nearly 40 years of burials, when was it placed there? I'll have to compare the engraving on the three sides and see if I can determine that information. I'm glad I have good images of all four sides of the stone.

Relationship to Silas Solomon Stowe is possible but not a connection that I have made so far. My closer Stowe ancestors migrated through New Hampshire, Vermont and Wisconsin to points west. Some went through western New York to Michigan and Indiana but I have accounted for most of them into the 20th century.

MaryLynn

Mike · #14 01-02-2005, 12:30 PM

Some thoughts:

For lighting a marker, get a large piece of cardboard, cover one side with crumplied (then smoothed out) kitchen aluminum foil. You can either tape or staple the foil to the cardboard, this make a reflector to shine light where it does not normaly shine! If you paint the other side of the cardboard with flat black, then you can subtract light from the marker. Play with the cardboard till you find the correct angle to hold it at to get the best photo. You can fold this thing up to keep in the trunk of your car.

ASK FIRST! I have cleaned many markers and found that I could then read them. A fairly stiff brush, some soap, water and elbow grease. Many places do not have the staff or money to do this and welcome your help. I also have used waterbased poster paint to fill the letters, taken the photo, then washed the paint off right away. ASK FIRST!

Be observant. Found a couple of markers that had sunk into the ground so far the some of the text was below the grass. I cut the turf, rolled it back a little, cleaned the dirt off and then took the photo. They said we could reset the marker if we wanted to, but the thing was huge (500 lbs??) so we deceided not too.

I also shoot in color, then in PS look at all the channels to see if there is a "good" one. Playing with the curves will sometimes increase the detail.

Hope this helps.

Mike

Cincy Gal · #15 01-02-2005, 08:12 PM

Mike it sounds like you've read the same book I have on cemtery research! Unfortuneately the segment of the stone that I posed is the only written area. It's one of three in a row all the same style. One for this woman, "Mary", one for her husband and one for thier daughter who died at age 20. the other two are COMPLETELY unreadable. In fact, I wouldn't have been able to find these three if I hadn't gotten in touch with another distant relative that had already located these three and gave me directions of where to find them. The wild thing is that this person took pics of the same three markers this summer and I took mine in about early Oct. Mine shows a baby's marker between two of the three larger markers, her pics taken in the summer doesn't show any marker there! Someone must have found it somewhere, I guess. I could only make out Mary's name in person my using my fingers to trace the words. Once my eyes saw that, then I could make out bits and pieces.

I've found one relative's marker that was fallen over, and broken in three pieces with grass growning up in between the cracks. Thank heaven it wasn't 500lbs!! And I've just found out that another relative's marker was destroyed by vandles about 20 years ago, so I'm going to have to look along the cemetery's fence line to see if it was maybe places over there. I don't understand why people would do that?!?!

Next spring, after it thaws out around there, I'll go back and try different lighting tricks. I've got a portable halogen light that I'll try to use to see if I can get something.

MaryLynn, this stone is my GGGGrandmother's. I'm lucky that most of them born after this era are still in pretty good shape. but if you get a hold of the caretaker where your relative is buried and they don't mind, you should be able to clean the moss off the stone and see the inscription more clearly.

Ed, thanks for the suggestions. Now, could you put them in to "non-photographer" speak? lol I'm not sure what you mean by resampling the pic. Photoshop takes it from my pictures folder. And where would I find these "channels". I DO know what you're talking about when you take about the curves, that I've found.

And I'll just say "hi" to Dave since he's still working on my post. I'd hate to disturb him.