Make it new again.
Digital Restoration and Retouching allows for us to bring life back into old or forgotten images that have become damaged and vulnerable over the years. Along with digitization of old images, we offer full restoration, retouching, and editing services for print, film, and digital photographs. Once an image is digitalized, it can easily be archived, shared, and preserved for future generations.
Photographs are typically one of the most cherished objects within a home. They are cherished because they represent a memory. This can be the memory of childhood, a place you've been, or an activity that you've done. Typically the most important photographs are the images of people that we love. Many people assume that like a diamond, photographs are forever. The old saying "take a picture, it will last longer" remains in many people's heads when thinking about the life of a photograph. The truth is that photographs do last a long time if properly stored and displayed (typically photographs can last between 50-200 years dependent on the type of printing process and paper used).
Bringing life back to an old image…
Unfortunately there are many perils within the home that can affect the life and integrity of a printed image. Ultra-Violet light (the sun) can quickly cause the best images to start to fade. Given enough Ultra-violet exposure, and the image can disappear completely. The print surface is susceptible to scratches and dings caused by mishandling. Much like wood floors, humidity can also cause problems for prints. The paper fibers of the print will expand and contract dependent on the amount of ambient humidity in the air. This can sometimes cause pigments and inks to fade or bleed over.
Fix, Print, and Share….
Many old framed photos have a piece of cardboard behind the image to insure that the print doesn't move in the frame. While the cardboard does stabilize the print, the acid in the cardboard will cause the image to fade and cause colors to shift. Some mattes bordering the print within a frame can also have acid in them. When the photo is removed from the matte, there will be a distinct outline of where the matte laid over the print. The oils in our hands can also soak into a print given enough time. When this happens, the old fingerprints will start to discolor the print where the oil settled into the paper.
Bringing back a lost memory…
Along with all of the normal perils within the home, there are many other opportunities for prints to become damaged, destroyed, or lost over time. It only takes a minute for a curious toddler to color, rip, and tear the priceless photos within an old family album. Many of the objects within a home can be replaced, however old family photographs are irreplaceable. Ask anyone that has lost all of their old photos due to fire or a move. Accidents, mistakes, and bad luck can happen anytime and many of our old photographs are single copies (the existing print).
The restoration process provides a way to safely turning old printed photographs (or film stock) into hi-resolution digital images going forward. This way, you can make as many copies of the photograph as you want and you can give digital copies of the image to anyone you want without risk of damaging the original print. Once the image is digitized, it can then be edited, enhanced, printed and shared.
Getting the most from your digital images...
Restoration and retouching services are not only for old photographs. We also frequently provide retouching services for newer images. Digital photography has forever changed the workflow of photography. For the first time, editing is available for everyone. Before digital photography, editing was only done by those that were hand printing their own images at home or at a lab. Now people have the opportunity to apply all kinds of edits to images to get the most from the digital capture. One of the first disappointments for many people is seeing their first digital images without any sort of editing. The colors are always muted, the image lacks sharpness, detail appears to be lost in hi-lights and shadows, and color casts can be prevalent.
Polishing off the results…
Digital files can be edited individually or as a group (such as images provided by another photographer from a family session or wedding). Each and every file is edited to insure the best color, tonality, and skin tones to provide a natural and desirable looking photo. We’re able to work with JPEG, TIFF, DNG, or RAW files and deliver everything back as a edited high resolution JPEG or TIFF image.
Enhancing your favorite photos...
Retouching services provide a way of enhancing your digital images to create the best photographs. This can be anything from covering up blemishes, swapping faces from different photos, whitening teeth, adding hair, or just making sure that the photos represent the best possible version of the subjects. Our goal when doing retouching services is to never let the viewer know that an image has been edited… All edits are subtle with the end goal always being a print worth file. Instead of hearing “what happened?” when looking at the photo, we prefer to hear “wow, we look great!”.
Unlocking the full potential….
Modern digital files can include so much more data than what we first see when looking at the back of the camera. With the right editing tools, additional details can be resolved and displayed in the final photograph.