Some time ago I was asked to restore a very large old image of a Scout gathering in Carisbrook Dunedin taken in 1931. The image is fascinating as it has so much happening in it - there are troops of boys building things, standing, climbing as well as a large audience watching. If is also interesting as an example of an early panorama taken long before images could be digitally stitched together in Photoshop or by the push of a button in your camera. The image is for a book by Owen Rogers on the History of Scouting in NZ entitled Adventure Unplugged.
This proved to be a fun challenge! Not only did the original image have the usual problems of foxing and fading but it was originally taken as two images and joined together! (I suspect the original two photos may have been manually cut). At some stage someone had placed a round object directly onto the photo which proved to be the hardest part to fix as I also needed to bring out details in the background at the same time and get rid of the circle shape. But I love a challenge. After numerous layers of work I can say that I am really pleased with the final result, Owen was too.
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