Evgeniya & Dominic Righini-Brand

Guía para principiantes para retocar fotografías antiguas en Adobe Photoshop

Hi Andrea! Thank you for sharing your work and the story behind this photograph. I love seeing old photos like these, partly because so many of the photographs taken back then have 'serious poses', so it is genuinely nice to see something a little less serious which has survived!Regarding over exposed photographs, firstly it really depends on what you are working with (negative or print). For example some of my late grandfather's old photographs which he took during World War Two are very small contact prints (printed by placing the negative over some photo paper and then exposing it to light) stuck in a scrap book — the original negatives no longer exist and in many cases the exposure of the photograph (or the print) is over or under exposed. In this case I scan at the best resolution possible and then try to adjust the exposure in Photoshop afterwards, typically using the Exposure, Level and Curve Adjustments. As you have mentioned sometimes adding (or removing) a vignette can help, especially if it brings some depth to the photograph. The Dodge and Burn tools can be really useful here for correctly select areas, e.g. the sky in the top corner. When scanning, and depending on your scanners settings, you can try adjusting the scanner's gamma setting — this helps increase the range of light which the scanner can perceive. But ultimately, and especially with small photographic prints, if there is no information there, then it can't be adjusted afterwards. If however you have the original negative available, then I would usually go with this, even if I had a photographic print as well. I'd only go with the print over the negative if the negative was in such poor condition that it would be easier working with the print. You'll get much more information out of a good negative, and can scan in raw and at an increased colour depth (e.g. 16-bit). All of these things will increase the amount of information available and make it easier to adjust the exposure afterwards, if necessary.With your photo you could try reducing the contrast a tiny bit, because it's taken on a sunny day and has strong shadows. I would also maybe add a light grain (see Filter Gallery, Texture).Yes, why not! It would be a good photographs to start colourisation with, even if it showed some of the limitations of Photoshop's Neural Color Filter. I suspect it would struggle colouring your grandmother's dress, and differentiating it from the wooden fence and plants in the foreground. But after apply the process, you can then manually colour select areas afterwards. Generally speaking the Neural Color Filter likes photographs with a high resolution and a full range of panchromatic colours. It struggles with mixtures of green and red because these throw up very similar shades of grey!Hope this helps. Thanks again for sharing, and really looking forwards to your future work! ;DDom

Thank you so much for your thoughtful and detailed response! Unfortunately, I don't have the negatives for any of these old photos. This print is actually quite small too, the original is only 6.5x11 cm. 

I tried to colorize this one but it didn't look great. Need some more practice! I used another photo though which I will post in that class and I'm pretty happy with the results.

I'm having so much fun working with these old photos thanks to your fantastic instruction! Thanks again!

Working with old photos, especially when they are a part of your family history is addictive! I also have the same problem with many of my family’s old pictures. My grandfather had his own makeshift darkroom in a barn and used to print up his photos on tiny scraps of paper. They never had much money back then, so he had to be ultra-frugal with his photography!! From my mother I gather they had a period where they got rid of most of there negatives (not sure why, and the destruction of negatives sounds like pure vandalism to me), thus we are left with only his tiny scrapbook prints, save for a few precious sets of negatives which were somehow saved from the fire! 
Unfortunately with very small images colouring can be difficult, unless you are prepared to accept a certain aesthetic (like it’s been hand painted). Looking forwards to see the results from the other image in my colourisation class. ;D

This photo is of my great grandma and great grandpa in the 1920s when they were first married.
My great grandma was trying to do a serious photoshoot, so in an attempt to make her laugh, my great grandpa leaned in and gave her a little pinch. I love how silly this photo is and wanted it to be my first attempt at photo restoration!
I'm fairly happy overall with it but I had trouble correcting the overexposure from the original shot. Even with some vignetting and various adjustments to contrast, white balance, etc., I felt the white areas were still a bit blown out. Any suggestions on working with overexposed photos in the future?
Thank you for such a concise and thorough course! I'm excited to continue improving my skills. Do you think this would be a good candidate for your colorization course? Thanks again, Dom!
 
Before
<img srcset="https://static.skillshare.com/uploads/project/609ac30a0e53f02232af86d670f9acfc/7da7fb83.jpg 600w, https://static.skillshare.com/uploads/project/609ac30a0e53f02232af86d670f9acfc/7da7fb83.jpg 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" src="https://static.skillshare.com/uploads/project/609ac30a0e53f02232af86d670f9acfc/7da7fb83.jpg" loading="lazy" alt="Family photo restoration project - image 1 - student project">
 
After
<img srcset="https://static.skillshare.com/uploads/project/609ac30a0e53f02232af86d670f9acfc/4e7cb215.jpg 600w, https://static.skillshare.com/uploads/project/609ac30a0e53f02232af86d670f9acfc/4e7cb215.jpg 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" src="https://static.skillshare.com/uploads/project/609ac30a0e53f02232af86d670f9acfc/4e7cb215.jpg" loading="lazy" alt="Family photo restoration project - image 2 - student project">

Family photo restoration project

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