My grandson Monty is now 5 months old and as he is off to Tuscany in July he needs a passport! I was called on to do the honours and here is the photo I took and the resulting passport photo – straightened and with supporting hand removed.
While I had my camera out I took a series of portraits and made a montage of them,
My customers Bart and his wife Ania contacted me with a project to make a montage of photographs taken during Ania’s pregnancy.
Here are the original photographs and the final result after having matched tone, scale and lighting of each original print, then removed all the colour except the baby’s shoes!
Here’s Bart’s story:
“We had been taking pictures of Ania each month of her pregnancy to see how much she would be changing. Each picture was taken in the same pose, wearing the same clothes and at the same place. Somewhere in between we had moved houses and the background had changed. We made a decision that all ten pictures should be composed in one panoramic view with a neutral background. Richard from Photographs Forever gave us professional advise and was in contact through each step of the process. We decided to print it in black and white with spot colour accentuating the baby shoes, which had been given to me as a present by my wife right after she found out that we were having our long awaited baby!”
A couple of months ago I was asked by the Royal Ashdown Forest Golf Club to restore some very old deteriorating photographs which the club wanted to use to feature in their refurbishment program. Last week I got the opportunity to take some photographs of the finished project.
Senior member of the Golf Club is Colin Strachan and this is the story behind these original old photographs:
“I began collecting old photographs to include in my book Fair Ways in Ashdown Forest to celebrate the 125 years of Royal Ashdown Forest Golf Club 3 years ago.These came from albums of the 1890s and the image resolutions were not up to the standard the layout designer requested.
I searched online for help and was pleasantly surprised to find that the site which appeared to offer the best service for enhancement and photographic restoration was Photographs Forever at nearby Chelwood Gate.
In June 2014 Richard Haines of Photographs Forever was asked to restore a further sepia 30 images which now grace the walls of the Clubhouse.
The largest of these is 1.8 m across.They look superb and the members of the Club have been fulsome in their praise of the new hangings.
Meanwhile the book and its many old photographs has won the coveted Murdoch Medal for the best contribution to the Heritage of Golf in 2014”
I have just put together a small brochure “How To Make The Most Of Your Photographs”. If you would like me to email you a copy please email me at Richard@PhotographsForever.co.uk
Take a look at the new 1 minute video showing some examples of photograph restoration and how to make the most of your precious photographs
In the late 1800s and early 1900s, photographs were very special, expensive and relatively rare. Ever since I came into possession of my parents and grandparents boxes of old family photographs, I have become passionate about making something of these wonderful images. I would like to share with you what I’ve realised as a result.
Looking at each photo individually, I suddenly realised for myself how special photographs used to be. Some of them taken by my grandparents are of family groups but the really special ones are the ones which are posed in studios; with props such as furniture or detailed backcloths. I realised how wonderful and enjoyable they were to look at and, if I didn’t do something with them, they would continue to be tucked away, out of sight and forgotten again.
I had shown my brother the boxes of photographs and we went through them together reminiscing about the only remaining pictures of our grandparents, parents, aunts and uncles. There was a particularly special photograph of our grandma and granddad with two friends sitting on a wooden bridge in the Isle of Man long before my parents were born. I have since scanned, printed an enlargement, framed it and now enjoy looking at it every day. My brother was very keen to have copies of many of the photographs. I realised then that these photographs are completely unique; these are the only copies in existence anywhere and are therefore extremely precious. If anything were to happen to these photographs the visual evidence of our family history would be lost forever.
So this realisation was when my passion for photograph restoration began.
It was only after I had scanned all the photographs and was looking through them on my computer screen that I noticed all the detail in the photographs that I had missed when looking at the small original prints. Prints that were only a couple of inches square I could now see as 19inch pictures on my computer screen. Clothing styles, hats, jewellery, shoes and many other details now became clear to see, and this I found fascinating. From these scans I was now able to make additional prints and enlargements that always give me lots of pleasure when I look at them.
Many of the original box of prints, now they are in a digital format, have been uploaded to our family tree on Ancestry.com as well as making a new style photobook for both my brother and myself so we can see these photographs very easily whenever we want. We were able to include captions and names of those people we recognised so that future generations would know at least some of the family history. Putting the photobook together was actually really enjoyable as well as being very rewarding.
I have found myself, and many others that I have met agree, that as we get older we definitely start to become very interested in older generations and nostalgia generally. I would strongly recommend that you take the opportunity, while you can, to talk with your relatives and write down information about their earlier years and any stories handed down from earlier generations. Ask them to identify the people featured in your family photographs. This is precious information that, if not recorded, will be gone forever. I certainly wish I had taken more of an interest in this information when my parents were alive. There are many photographs amongst my own that show people, whose identity is unknown.
This realisation of the importance of documenting and preserving important photographs led to my starting Photographs Forever giving me the opportunity help others to make the most of their photographs.
Every week I talk to people who greatly regret not finding out more about their family history while their older relatives were still around. I really encourage you to find out as much information while you can, as soon as you can, and document their fascinating stories. There is so much you can then pass down to your children and grandchildren. My clients often say that their children show no interest in family history but, believe me, they will when they reach a certain age!
My love for these old photographs led me from scanning to learning the skills necessary to restore and improve those photos that were damaged, faded or deficient in some way or another. I now digitally restore photographs every day and find the whole process very rewarding, particularly when I receive as much gratitude and positive feedback as I do.
These days so many photographs are taken on (often poor quality) mobile phones or with digital cameras in such large quantities, they are very rarely printed or even looked at other than in the following days and weeks of them being taken. Even when they are downloaded onto the computer they are often not looked at. This is particularly alarming when you realise that if your phone were lost or your computer were to crash that all your modern-day photographs could be completely lost.
Another area that became interesting to me was to make favourite photographs better. I noticed that I had photographs that I liked but they were spoilt by having unwanted elements included in the picture. This could be an ugly building or a telegraph pole appearing to come out of a person’s head! With modern technology I can rectify virtually all shortcomings. Unwanted people can be removed from group photographs, a picture can be created by combining the best parts of two or more photographs. The sky isn’t the limit!
I would therefore encourage you to devote a little time, time you will most likely find enjoyable, to get your photographs together. Look through them, get them scanned and think about sharing them, putting together a photobook or making enlargements to frame and put on show. Remember to consider those future generations with all your photographs old and new – they will thank you!
I recently received a photograph from Bridie F asking if I could remove the extra person from the photograph of her Mum and Dad. This I did and created her Mum’s right arm at the same time! When this was done Bridie asked if I could gently colourise it in a way similar to those hand coloured at the time of the original photograph. Here is the original photograph, the manipulated version, the colourised version and finally the framed print in situ.
Photographs Forever – Photograph Restoration Example
Here’s Bridie’s story of the photograph:
“This photograph taken in rural Ireland on a sunny afternoon in 1935 shows a happy, smiling young couple, full of the joy of young love and the happiness of youth. In this photo Richard has created the picture of my parents that I have always wished existed, and that now holds pride of place in my sideboard family gallery.
The original, taken by my mother’s sister on an outing as a foursome, also has another young man standing beside my mother. Within weeks of the outing my aunt had sailed off to America to begin a new life, like so many Irish before her, and her young man went on to marry another local girl. The blossoming romance between my mother and father was forbidden on the grounds that she, as the daughter of a respectable but peasant farmer, was an unsuitable match for this young man from a well to do land owning family. Their relationship continued punctuated by meetings at the local dances and later by clandestine meetings in neighbouring towns for a few short hours at a time. It was to be eleven long years before they were eventually to marry in May 1946, and even then it was against his family’s wishes and without their blessing. Only my mother’s father, her friend and my father’s friend who had driven them over to the next town attended the ceremony. After a few days in Dublin by way of a honeymoon, my mother returned home and her new husband, unable to return to his family, travelled to England and began to build a new life for them both. He quickly saved enough to put a deposit on a small run down cottage, where they were reunited and spent the next fifty years together making a home and raising five daughters. Only the death of my mother was to separate them again in all those years, and even then only for a short time.
Virtually no photographic evidence of this period of their lives exists, and although I am happy to have the original photo to record the day it is impossible to express how wonderful it is to have this lovely gently coloured picture showing a time in their romance that I have only been able to imagine. This has only been made possible by Richards’s patience and skill for which I shall be forever grateful.”
I received a letter from Jackie, her letter said
“Please find enclosed a photo of my dad, which I hope you can restore. My dad died in May 1947 and I was born a month after in June 1947, this photo is all I have of him.”
Here’s the photo I received
Here’s the photograph after restoration followed by Jackie’s email to me when she had received the enlargement
“Dear Richard, Thank you so much for what you did to dads photo, I never knew a photo in that condition could be restored perfectly. I can now get a proper image of what my dad looked like, as I never had the pleasure of knowing him. I have one remaining sister and she was only 7 when he died, she only remembers bits n pieces about dad, it may sound strange but this photo will bring me that much closer to dad, n you have managed to do that for me, n I thank you for that…” Jackie
Shirley T brought a small but high quality print to me and asked for it to be scanned and enlarged. The original print is about 8cm (3 inches) square. The final enlargement I supplied was 76cm (30 inches) square. Here is the before, after and the close up of a detail of the tree.
The Speich family formed a significant presence in the Sernf Valley of Switzerland in the 13th, 14th, 15th and 16th Centuries but during the latter part of the period economic depression and repeated plagues drastically reduced the population and of course the Speichs.
The difference between the format used by the professional company that compiled the Speich Tree and that found in this Country is that it starts at the centre with the latest members of the family and expands outwards to include the earliest members of the family that could be traced including, where possible, their dates of birth and death, their occupations and their coats of arms.
Shirley’s dad’s uncle commissioned the work which is all hand painted we think about 70 years ago. The tree detail goes back to 14th century!
Increasingly popular is the idea of having a collection of framed photographs in an area of the house. Here’s a staircase collection
