Remove Photopaper Texture From Old Photos

[Flora]

One way to remove texture from old pictures using Photoshop and a Noise Removing Software. [details]

[Flora]

I know I'm being the usual pain in the neck ... but .... pleeeaaaseee ... could someone tell me if the images of this tutorial are showing??

...Thanks!!!

[byRo]

No luck yet, just little black boxes with X

Rô

[Flora]

Thanks Roland!!!!

I'll just have to go back and check....

I hate this 'publishing' thing ....

[FrannyMae]

Flora, the pics loaded fine for me! And the final result is amazing! I am going to try your result and see how it compares with what I can do just using my new scanner. Plus it is such a great technique to know. Thanks so much for the great tutorial.

[Flora]

FrannyMae,

thank you so much for your great help and feedback!

[byRo]

Flora,
Just to confirm, everthing's loading fine now - still loading because I'm at home on dial-up now, been 20 minutes already but I know it's worth the wait.

Rô

[Flora]

Hi Roland,

thanks for your feedback!

glad to hear it finally worked!!!!

...I know the many images I used make a dial-up downloading very, very slow .... ...
Where I'm staying at the moment, (and I'll be here for the next 6 months..) I also have only a dial-up connection .... It just took me ages to upload the tutorial.... (mind you .... I always get it wrong the first time so, having to repeat the procedure it certainly doesn't help!!!)

[Gary Richardson]

Hi Flora, great tutorial, great images. Thanks for all your hard work on our behalf.

[Flora]

Wow!

Thanks, Gary!

[Ed_L]

Flora, you're an absolute marvel! Thanks for posting. Now, will you marry me?

Ed

[Flora]

Wow Ed!!!

Thank you so much for your kindness!!!! ....

As for 'the rest' .... I'm sure we could arrange something....

[Leah]

Wow, Flora, this is outstanding -- and something that I'm sure almost al of us can use!

If you were doing this on a colour image would you be inclined to work on the colour channels individually or do the whole thing at once?

[Flora]

Hi Leah,

thank you so much for your kind words!!!

I haven't tried to remove the honeycomb pattern from a colour picture yet....If I remember well, Doug posted one in the past .... I'm going to find it and work on it .... I'll let you know.

Take care ...

[Flora]

Hi Leah,

... sorry to get back to you so late....

I found the post .... here

The image wasn't actually posted by Doug, but I hope it's OK ... I tried both approaches on it .... and, for this particular picture, I found the 'overall' technique worked best ....

[Leah]

Thanks! I have a whole bunch of these from the 1970s and will have to try this out (I've never been entirely satisfied with what I've managed to do before).

[ajcutler]

Flora:

Thank you so much for doing this wonderful tutorial! Its the best method for removing photopaper texture I have seen.

I used your method on FrannyMae's photo of her Mom and colorized it. (FrannyMae told me the color of the hair an eyes).

Alan

[Flora]

Leah,

Hope this works for your pictures!!!!

Alan,

WOW!!!! Stunning .... simply stunning!!!!

.... Sorry forgot my manners .... Thank you so much for your great feedback!!!

[ajcutler]

Flora:

Wow! Thank you very much for the compliment! The hard part was done by using your method which made the colorizing a lot easier. It was a pretty picture to begin with.

Alan

[Duv]

Flora, Thanks so much for your tutorial. When I look back at what we were accomplishing with texture removal just one year ago..it's amazing how far we, "you" have progressed.
Alan, what you have done is really superb.
My question is this. Rather than Neat Image, I used Noise Ninja and tried to use the absolute minimum amount of reduction to retain critical detail in the eyes, mouth and nose. There is still a small amount of noise left. Do I try to take it further to remove all texture or should I leave well enough alone. What I'm afraid of is losing detail in her right eyebrow.
Thanks for your help!

Cheers
Dave

[ajcutler]

Dave:

First of all thank you very much!

I looked at your fine retouching and at 100% I saw very little texture left, even at 200% it is a little more noticable but still not bad, so I would be inclined to leave it as is.

Alan

[Flora]

Hi everybody,

Dave,

Thank you so much for your kindness!

Great, great job!!

But....I can still see some of the 'blasted' pattern lines in the darker parts of her face...

What I would try is duplicate the background twice:

• run the first duplicate throught Noise Ninja with stronger settings,
• for the second duplicate (on top), use the settings you used here.
• Create a Layer mask for the 'softer settings' (top) Layer and, with a soft black brush (Opacity 20-40%), paint over the pattern that can still be decreased without loss of too many details ...

To bring back some of the deatils in her hair, with the help of a Layer Mask, I partially uncovered the hair from the original background and used the Smudge Tool to help hide the pattern...

Please let me know if it works for you....