Instructor Seminar Photo Restoration
This was one of the first images I ever restored using Photoshop. The original was a 5″ x 7″ print that had seen better days. It was on glossy paper, had a yellowish cast, staple holes, wrinkles and creases and damaged corners. There were also visible defects in the exposure, surface scratches and other things that had to be corrected. Unfortunately, I don’t have a larger image for comparison, I returned the original many years ago.
The photo itself is of historic importance. The event that this commemorates took place on August 8-9 in 1987 in Cebu City, Philippines, and was instrumental in the creation of the World Ekrima Kali Arnis Federation (WEKAF), which was the first international sporting organization for the Filipino Martial Arts community (competitive stickfighting). One of my instructors is in this photo, and those who are familiar with the community will recognize many other significant instructors from a variety of systems and lineages.
As you can see in this close up, the image had been put up on a bulletin board with thumb tacks and staples at different times, and had seen a lot of abuse. You can see above the heads in the darker area, a defect in the exposure, possibly from the act of printing it, possibly from a scratch in the negative. There was also some dust and noise in the darker areas.
In the top center of the photo was the most damage, it was clearly stapled and the surface deformed. There was more corner damage in the upper left as well. Once I corrected these defects, I then worked on the color, trying to balance the warmth of the bright and unforgiving Philippine sun with what I knew about color of the shirts these people were wearing.
Fortunately most of the damage occurred in areas of flat color. This was a pretty easy fix.
Got Photos?
I offer photo retouching, restoration and image manipulation services for an hourly fee. If you have an image that is precious to you that you would like to have restored, send me a scan of the image and I can quote you an estimate. If you have an idea for a photo montage, or some other idea involving manipulating photos, contact me, I’d love to hear about it.
Just remember that although I can do an awful lot to improve an existing photo, but there are limits. Looking through the images below you will be able to see just what can be done. If an image is missing complete sections, it may not be possible to restore that. Likewise, if an exposure is too light or too dark, there may simply not be enough information to perform the restoration.
You can use the form on this page to contact me.
Sage Arts Studio