Before & After : Wedding Day

In two weeks my parents will be celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary.  People often wonder how couples like my parents "make it".   I think it's because they're from a time when you didn't just get divorced. You worked through your problems together and stuck it out until the bad times turned good again.  And honestly, if the foundation is good, the good times will always come back around.

I often wonder if my parents feel disappointed that all of their kids divorced their first spouses.  We all made much better choices the second time around, but still.  I think they're disappointed for us, not in us.  And happy that we found happiness in different partners. At least, I hope so.  Now that I have that good foundation, I'm hoping The Hubs and I can make it to our 50th.  Of course, I'll be 79 and The Hubs will be 86, but maybe we'll both still be around to celebrate together.  My parents are role-models for sure, and I wouldn't mind if The Hubs and I end up just like them.

As we near this momentous date for my parents, I thought it appropriate to do a little before & after on their wedding photo.  As far as we all know, this is the ONLY photo we have left.  There was a fire on the farm property before I was born, that burned down their cabin with all of their memorabilia including all their wedding photos.  This picture was apparently in my Aunt Wanda's collection and so was saved the same fiery fate as the rest.  So, if you're family, and you know of another photo, give a shout out.  We'd love to see it!

The photo itself is in pretty good shape. Some typical dust and scratches.  The biggest concern is the horizontal banding in the photo and the high volume of noise or graininess in the picture overall.  And of course, it could use some color adjusting to get rid of the pink tinge the photo has.  I'm not sure if this is age, or just how the picture turned out, or both.

And here's the after.  On the bottom left I believe that's my mother's bouquet and wedding purse on top of a family bible. I absolutely adore her little pill-box hat and the fur trim on her jacket.  I would have loved to see what the dress looked like under the jacket, but I believe it went up in flames with all the wedding photos.

I'm excited about how this photo turned out.  It cleaned up to be almost like it was taken that very first day almost 50 years ago..

Seriously.. Thoughts?

Before & After: Dad's Family

My dad sent me this photo of his family before his dad, Wilbur passed away.  My Aunt Wanda (who has since passed away) on the right, my dad is to her left and my Uncle Jerry is the littlest.   It wasn't until I started working on this, that I realized how much my sister looked like my Aunt Wanda.  Crazy how genetics work no?

The image is soft over-all and lacking in contrast.  And has a lot of dust, scratches and what appear to be a few holes.  And it looks like someone may have gotten their finger slightly in the photo on the left hand side.  There are also some creases on the upper left and right side of the photo.  Love that cool old car.

And here's the after.  My Dad is guessing this photo was taken around 1947 or 1948.  So, not long after WWII ended and the very tail end of the Great Depression.  If you look my dad's pants are way too long.  I think it might have been a sign of the times and being so poor when he was growing up.

Seriously.. Thoughts?

Now I'm Ready For My Close-Up

Bunny's picture from today's post was bugging me.  There was just too much green in the image, the white light was off and her skin-tones weren't right.

So I played with it. Here's the before.

And here's the after.

What do you think? Better?

Seriously.. Thoughts?

Home Grown Artwork

I took these photos at various times over the last year or so.

Super close-ups of the kids.  All the dirt on Bug's face included.

I even managed to get this lovely shot of GG using the manual settings on my camera!  Be proud.

All the kids, except for LW.  I haven't managed to take one of her, that I loved as much as I love these.  In part I think this because she doesn't like to sit still and have her picture taken, so I always feel rushed.  Once I get one of LW that I like, I plan to get them printed on 20" tall canvases and hang them in a set of four on our living room wall.  Maybe all side by side.

Maybe in a four-square.

I've even played around with the idea..

of making them..

black and white.

And maybe by posting this, LW will swing by (when she gets back from visiting with her mom in TN) and sit still long enough for me to get a great shot of her too.  Is that a good enough hint do you think?

What do you guys like best, color or black and white?

Seriously... Thoughts?

Opie & The Hubs

About 8 or 9 years ago, while we were cleaning out the house, I came across these old photos.

The really weird part about these photos is that they were all printed together on a roll of paper.

I can only assume this was done at some department store or other.

And yes, they're all cropped in that weird oval shape.

The photos included The Hubs, his brother and his sister.  Together and occasionally individually.

But the craziest part of all these great old photos?

The matching 70's tie and pant set!  I'm sure this was totally groovy back in the day.

Does anyone else think he looks a little like Opie?

Seriously.. Thoughts?

Before & After: Great Grandparents

These are my great grandparents on my Dad's side.  They're his Dad's parents (Albert and Josie) who passed away before he was born.

This image has not only has it seen some better days, but is pretty old and of poor quality to begin with.  The guess is it was taken in 1915 in front of their home in Anderson, IN based on the rough age of a cousin who appears in similar photos.  What really stumped me, was why it had that blue color. Most photos that discolor with age go yellow, not blue.  I searched all over the internet but didn't get any answers.  At first I thought it might have been a tintype photo and maybe they degraded with a blue tinge instead of yellow.  I don't have a lot of experience with those type of photos, but nothing I could find referenced it.  I finally spoke with my Dad who told me because they were pretty poor back in the day, this was likely printed by my Dad's cousin in his own darkroom on drafting blue print paper, which gives it that unique blue color. I felt like Scooby-doo solving a mystery!  Unfortunately, it also looks like maybe it had paper or a book on top of the main portion of the image, leaving the rest exposed to the sun to fade.

A little Photoshop magic, and here's what the image maybe should have looked like.  I couldn't completely get rid of the texture from the original paper it was printed on, but it does clean up nice.  Did you notice there's a collie on the ground behind Albert?  I didn't see him until I started cleaning up the image.

Seriously.. Thoughts?

Before & After - Aviation Cadet

In light of it being my Dad's birthday - Happy Birthday Dad!! - I give you my latest Before and After project.

This is my Dad's Aviation Cadet photo taken around 1960.  Aviation Cadets was founded in 1907 by the US Army Signal Corps to train it's pilots.  In 1947, the US Air Force took over the program and stopped taking civilians and enlisted pilot candidates in 1961 and navigator candidates in 1965.  So my dad got in just under the wire!

It's got some fold lines, yellowing from age, and a few scratches and dust, but overall this photo is in pretty good shape.

A little bit of clean-up mostly for color and voila.  Not my most dramatic Before & After, but I know it will mean a lot to my Dad.  And isn't this why I do it?  To bring memories back to life and make them like the day they were taken?

Seriously.. Thoughts?

Before & After - Seriously Damaged

I've been working the last few weeks on the image below for my amazing friend Cinda.  She's an architect and I do a fair amount of architectural photo compositing for her.  But this time she came with a more personal request for this old family photo.

As you can see there is a ton of damage on this photo.  The yellow actually appears to be some sort of fungus growing on the image itself.  And up close you can see all the dirt on the photo.  It's practically ingrained.  Here's the after.

Lots of different elements here.  Obviously the old standbys of the clone stamp tool, and I did a fair amount with the spot healing brush.  I did a lot with the hue and saturation to take some of the yellow splotches down to where I could work with them.  I had to rebuild the girl's hand because the damage there was so extensive with no big spaces to draw from.  I used dust & scratches tool.  And then levels and curves to really sharpen up the image and make the subjects pop.

Seriously.. Thoughts?

Before & After - Dad's Senior Photo

My dad is an avid genealogist.  In addition to helping me get all the information I needed to become a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution, I also got to learn all sorts of great family history.  Another amazing perk of his obsession is getting to see all these great old pictures and cleaning them up.

For your viewing pleasure, my dad's senior photo - before.

I absolutely LOVE these old style 50's photos with their crazy coloring!   I told my dad when I saw it that it looks like he's wearing rouge and orange lipstick.  But in a good way, honest!

The paper the photo is printed on is a thick heavy stock and has a definite texture to it. As you can see there's some scratch damage on the upper left hand side and what appears to be water damage maybe on the bottom right.  There's some additional smaller dirt and general age issues spread throughout. And the whole thing has a yellow cast that I suspect is due to age.

Clone Stamp, Spot Healing, Levels and some color tweaks later and we have the after.

That guy is pretty darn handsome if I do say so myself.

Seriously.. Thoughts?