Restored Photos featured in "Sure to Rise: The Edmonds Story"

Congratulations to Kate, Richard and Peter for successfully completing "Sure to Rise: The Edmonds Story". It was a pleasure for me to contribute to the project by helping Kate with the digitization and restoration of many of the family photos featured in the book. Kate possessed a remarkable collection of captivating early 20th-century photos showcasing her ancestors, which were tucked away in family photo albums. I digitized and revitalized selected images. Below are a handful of before and after examples showing the damage alongside their rejuvenated counterparts ......

Before: Family group photo - original size 24.7cm by 14cm and damage detail. Restoration included removal of scratchs, tear, dust spoting and stains (See damage in enlarged details)

After: Restored Family group featured as a double page spread in the book 25cm by 42cm     

Before: Ladies on the steps showing the original photo which measured 10.8cm by 6.3cm. Restoration included cropping and enlargement; removal of dust, silvering, minor marks and correction of overexposure. Photo Credit: Dianne Gallagher

After: The Ladies on the steps as featured in the final publication 16cm by 13.5cm.

Before: Photo of Thomas Edmonds supplied by others. Restoration involved minor lens correction, removal of damage - spotting dust and fading.

After: the restored portrait featured as a chapter heading in the book. 

LOOK BACK OVER KELBURN NORMAL SCHOOL’S FIRST 100 YEARS!

I am pleased to annouce that Kelburn Normal School's Centennial history book is now available. Jo from Carterworks was responsible for image digitisation, restoration and retouching.

LOOK BACK OVER KELBURN NORMAL SCHOOL’S FIRST 100 YEARS!

Kelburn Normal School - Celebrating 100 Years is a brand new 150+ page, fully bound, hard-cover photographic book charting the school’s first 100 years (1914-2014).

Using previously published historical information, newly sourced personal memories from some of the thousands of pupils who have passed through its doors, and hundreds of photographs from the school and national archives, it’s a fascinating look back at Kelburn Normal School.   

The book is chock-full of images of the school and its pupils from the past 100 years. Is your child, parent or great/grandparent within its pages? Many have already found theirs!

Priced at $70, the Kelburn Centenary Committee is selling the book at cost, with no profit for the school. Postage ($7.50 in New Zealand) is additional, or books can be picked up from the school’s office for free.

28th June: A new shipment of books has just arrived so if you have not already ordered now is a good time to place an order at https://www.kns100book.co.nz/

We hope you enjoy looking back over the first 100 years of Kelburn Normal School.

Kelburn Normal School Centenary dramatic colour photo transformation

I am busy scanning Kelburn Normal School class photos for the Centenary celebrations to be held in May 2014.  In the 1970s school photographers started offering school photos in black and white and colour. I can see why they did both...they were not sure about the stability of colour photographic processes.....this one is from 1977...

It looked a little red...I was delighted to discover that it responds well to a bit of photoshop magic!

 

 

For information about the reunion go to  http://www.kelburnnormalschool100.com/index.html or the facebook page  at https://www.facebook.com/KelburnNormalSchoolCentenary

An example of an old retouched photo from the Image Permanence Institute

I have discovered a wonderful on line resource  that you can use to help you identify and conserve your photos.  It is called the Graphics Atlas which has been put together by the Image Permanence Institute a New York based research centre.

This online resource includes examples of all different types of early photos, slides and negatives.  Information about the construction of different types of photographs, negative and slides, the sort of damage they typically suffer from, cross sections and close up views of the image are provided. 

Below is an example of an early retouched photograph from the Atlas, proving that retouching and restoration is not a new, and in fact was used in early photographs.

 

 

Copyright Carterworks NZ

Fascinating detective work by the Independent

The Independent has had a series of articles showing images taken from glass plate negatives that have recently been uncovered in the Somme area.  It is suspected they were taken by a local amature photographer who would have sold the prints from these negatives to subjects to send home to their loved ones.  One set of negatives is particularly interesting as it shows a woman dressed in an NZ uniform, see the story in the following link....

 

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/wwi-pictures-unearthed-the-mystery-of-the-man-in-the-lemon-squeezer-hat-8735047.html

 

And another about a different image from this time

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/more-wwi-pictures-unearthed-photographs-found-in-the-somme-come-to-light-8737623.html 

 



Restored image

Original image

Postcard images from this era were very popular and like many I have private images that were sent home (England) during this period. This one is of my great grandfather taken in Ypres (Leper) 1917.    It was probably taken by a local photographer and incorporated into a postcard image. 

Copyright Carterworks NZ

Instagram and vintage - they're fun but they are not the only option for your old slides & vintage photos

Recently I have noticed lots of fashion shoots with a vintage or instagram look.  These are great fun. There are now tons of phone apps and photoshop tutorials that show you how to create these effects – which can look great  if chosen well and applied to the right image….

I started to wonder where the idea came from to add these effects...............

I suspect it is a result of home scanning of family photos....

Old colour photos and slides naturally produce this vintage or retro instagram effect because the scanning process just copies the chemical damage caused to the film or print over time.  While some images look nice, others just don’t work.  A lot of people just don’t know how to fix this …..and think their only option is to throw their photos away!

The good news is you have options.  You don’t have to put up with this chemical damage once your images are digitised.  Any digitised image can be colour corrected and restored to bring out the true colours of the original image . In this photo taken in the early 1980s, the original is on the left, the restored one is on the right….

 

You can also get rid of other unwanted effects - dust, scratches, over exposure, shadow, and even people as in this example from my website which was a Kodachrome slide from the 1960s.

 

If you have some images sitting round home that look like this…

then give me a call ........they can be saved

Alternatively you can send your scanned photos directly to me via my file up-loader!

 http://www.carterworks.co.nz/cwphotorestorev3_010.htm

Copyright Carterworks NZ

Creating a photo wall

Like most people we had a collection of photograph frames given to us as presents over the years.  After having children  I always had the intention of framing some of our family photos and putting these on the wall...

...I read books on hanging artworks to try and give me inspiration.....but getting all the photos together was an ongoing process...... deciding what to hang and how to make the most of the arrangement of the frames my stairwell just got put in the "too hard basket".....

......it just wasn't happening...



Then recently I saw an article in a Your Home and Garden magazine where the owner of a house had just hung a whole lot of  white frames on her wall...
some had photos in them ...
some were empty....









The designers reasoning was - I have all  these frames  - lets just  arrange them on the wall to look good and I will fill them as an ongoing project.   At last, a solution to my problems! I didn't have to store those old photo frames in a box in the roof anymore - I could just hang them on the wall and over time I would fill them with images of my family.....

Hanging our photo frames proved quite a mission, because over the years we had amassed quite a collection....in fact we had nearly 30 frames....fortunately we have a large hallway!   I laid all the frames out on the floor and arranged them so they looked balanced.  I didn't have one consistent wood colour, or even frame colour ....but my decorating experience has taught me that you can mix different woods together and they will work....and gold and black and silver can complement the wood as well.  Using a straight edge, chalk and a spirit level I hung all of them.  It took me three days

Now I have a work in progress that I add to as I restore and add to my family photographic collection.

Scanning Glass Plate Negatives

 

Recently I was given a number of glass plate negatives to scan.  Their owner thought they dated from the late 1800s but wasn’t too sure what the images were as they were difficult to see.   The negatives had been stored away flat in wads of newspaper...

 

 

We have a special tray in our scanner that enables us to scan glass plate negatives with the emulsion side uppermost so the delicate emulsion does not need to be in contact with the glass of the scanner - many other scanners cannot do this. 

 

Can you imagine my excitment, these images had not been seen for many years! ....What would we uncover?  Below are a couple of images from the collection....



Click to enlarge

 

 

Glass plate negatives require careful handling and storing to avoid damage.  To protect these negatives it is best that they are stored vertically on their longest side and in individual archival envelopes. For more advice see http://natlib.govt.nz/collections/caring-for-your-collections/photographs

 

Copyright Carterworks (NZ)

A piece of family history discovered

 

 

 

So often we only know part of the story behind a family photo.  One of the advantages of digitisation is the ability to reproduce and share our photos, not only with family members but others in the community....this can lead to interesting discoveries.....

 

Recently I scanned and restored some photographs from a photograph album belonging an early Wellington family who settled here in the later part of the 1800s.  A family album dating from the late 1800s to early 1900s contained a number of beautiful sailing boat images, including one of a large ship stranded on the beach.  Neville, the photograph album owner thought the ship was wrecked somewhere down south, but knew nothing of its history.  I used this image recently, with Nevilles permission, in a pamphlet about my work, which I  took along  with me to a recent open day of the Southern Heritage Group,  held at the Island Bay Community Centre. When Marion from the group saw my brochure she instantly recognised the image and said “that’s the Bella, which was stranded at Owhiro Bay”.  She pulled out a file full of newspaper articles and including an image similar to, but not the same as the image I had scanned and restored from Neville’s album.  It was indeed the Bella.   I was delighted as I knew Neville did not have any information on the ship, its name, the date or where the stranding occurred so I was able to copy this and pass this information to Neville.  Neville was thrilled to discover new information about a piece of his family history.

 Copyright Carterworks NZ

An early NZ Panorama

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.

Copyright Carterworks NZ

Bikie Days

Original photo

Most recently I have been restoring a couple of biking photos taken in Auckland in the 1960s. These photos were scanned and emailed to me and featured an irregular texture that showed up in the scanning process.  After a couple of additional scans I was able to restore the faded colour, back to the original black and white as well as remove the texture. Below is the end result.

Restored photo

Kelburn Normal School Photos scanned

Over the last few weeks I have been scanning a large number old photos from our local school in Kelburn, Wellington dating from the early 1900s through to the pre-digital present. The school will celebrate its centenary in 2014 and over the next wee while I will be restoring those in need of attention. As you can image some of the photos need some restorative work.  I will feature some of the before and after restorations on this site