over exposure and ghosted image

[niteowl64]

I'm hoping someone has had a photo with the same problem and knows what to do. This is my latest and last photo fix for a friend and it has me so frustrated and stumped. Nothing seems to be working. As you can see, the problem is on the upper right. I don't know whether it's a glare of sunlight or over exposure. The photo had the same kind of spots peppered throughout it but not quite as bad as the window area.

I've tried everything and it always seems to look like bad a photochop mismatch. What's throwing me off alot is the fact that you see the reflection from the building across the street and the wall behind the actual window and it kind of gets more see through the window (naturally) the further right you go. I can't seem to duplicate that one part of the photo very well. Is it even a possible fix? I'm assuming it is but one I am not familiar with at all. What is the best rpoute to go?

Any help or advice, before I pull the last strand of hair out of my head over it, would be greatly ppreciated.

Very old photo in pretty good shape. You can even clearly see the chickens hanging in the window lol

[4personnen]

Re: over exposure and ghosted image

Hi!
there my quick 3 second fix...
copy blackground
select over exposed area, create mask with selection
apply "darken" or "multiply" to the upper layer
correct mask edge with the mask panel (if in cs4) or play with brush and a big amount of blur to melt the correction...
It's just a start...
try also to apply a dark grey solid color layer set in "overlay", with the same mask.
HTH

[0lBaldy]

Re: over exposure and ghosted image

Levels adjustment....Blended layers using Single image HDR... Then some Shadow/Highlight work... some history brush set at multiply and low opacity on the light areas... a bit of sharpening

Should look a lot better using the higher resolution

[philbach]

Re: over exposure and ghosted image

Well I used curves and levels initially. On the right side I used a layer mask only to darken and increase the contrast on the right side. What I did notice on the right was a series of what appeared to be vertical line artifacts? Maybe a rescan would help.

[niteowl64]

Re: over exposure and ghosted image

Oh thank you everyone. Now I won't have to wear a hat from pulling out my hair
Philback, I think the vertical lines you are refering to is the paneled wood wall inside the shop. It shows more on the right than anywhere. Seems odd to me that the reflection of the building starts strong and gets weaker the further right you go and the transparency of looking in the window far background detail starts weaker and gets stronger the further right you go. I'm guessing that's a product of the sunlight and perspective. I no longer have the original to rescan either

Thanks Obaldy and 4person for the steps. I've never used history brush so i better move my bottom and learn it and get better at masks as well. I was not using the correct steps to maximize it. So nice to know what to look for next time. I've got a another photo of the same shop front in my long term projects. I think I can steal alot from this one for that one. However angle and perspective is much different in second photo and I am trying to figure out how to do that. If it's skew, distort, perspective or warp I need to use (i've not had a photo I needed to use any of them before). I'll figure it out eventually I hope.

[aartist]

Re: over exposure and ghosted image

I had to read through your post a couple times
to figure out the photo's problem. Reflection or
glare to me is natural and not a blemish to be
repaired. But I do see you say it was covering
other areas, so you must have restored most of
this photo already.

Darken/Lighten to reduce down blotches and glare.

[niteowl64]

Re: over exposure and ghosted image

aartist. Yes it was in other areas but it appeared they were damage and not a natural occurance like the one spot here. I did not blend it as well as I would have liked or I wouldn't have had the blotches as you mentioned. As I started repairing it, I couldn't always tell what was damage to the photo and what was not damage but crappy old building in bad shape. The building itself was definitly beat up but not always easy to tell the difference

Wow, you really did help those blotches! Your a peach The garden variety fixes, i'm getting good at but with this friend's photos, i hit quite a bit of things I hadn't encountered much or if at all. Experience is the best teacher, thank you for your help and advice