Disappearing Tape

Take a look at your photographs with tape in various areas. Always scan the entire photo to preserve the original image. Then consider cropping out as much of the tape as possible by moving the scanner's selection tool and scanning the smaller section (with less tape showing) at a high enough resolution to print at the size you desire. Photo editing techniques can lighten the tape or make it a different color to help make it disappear. Don't let that tape keep you from preserving those damaged images. If you have to scan a photo taped to an album, look at the tips on other blog posts regarding scanning from albums.

Photos Stuck to Glass

Sometimes photos get stuck to flat glass, sometimes to domed glass. Depending on the situation, it might require a professional's help in scanning if you are facing an issue with curved glass. However, if the glass (with photo stuck to it) will fit your scanner bed, place a transparency sheet down on the glass bed of your scanner. Then carefully place the glass and photo down over the transparency sheet so you don't scratch your scanner's bed. Scan at correct resolution for print size. Then carefully lift the glass and photo. Most of the time there will be problems with color, tears, cracks, or changes in surface texture. If it's a one-of-a-kind photograph, it's better to try and get a good scan before the image degrades any further. Digital editing can be done at any time. Preserving the original should be your prime motivation to scan as soon as possible.

Making a Copy vs. Making a Scan

When a friend showed me a page from her family history, this stunning photograph (to the left) caught my eye immediately. Turns out she had taken a beautiful original photo of her mother into a local copy store and had several prints made to distribute to family members. This was one of those prints.

I scanned her old photo at 600 dpi so that it could be printed at twice the original's size, as my friend requested. You can see from the image (photo to the right) that making a scan of a photo is a better choice than getting a print from a copy shop. Although there is fairly good equipment available now for making copies, a scan is still the best choice for capturing all the subtle lighting and details in your family's photographs.

"Well, shut my mouth"...an old Southern saying comes to life!

Recently a friend showed me her only photo of an ancestor and asked if this gentleman (born about 1839) could have a digital "makeover." Intent on maintaining her historical collection of photographs, she knew the original would never be harmed in the process.

Because of the relatively plain background this "fix" was quick and easy. A digital cut made across the entire photo and through his mouth enabled the top half of the photo to be slid down just enough to make his mouth look much more natural. Sure, the "blown out" lighting is one of the hardest (if not impossible) things to bring back. But at least this family's collection now includes a kinder-looking version of this amazing photo.

Yellowing Photo

Ah, those yellowed 70's photos...They just might hold enough color to recover an amazing print. Scanning an image printed on that "bumpy" paper of old yields "dots" which can be overcome by blurring the scanned image a bit. However, if your original is blurry to begin with, you might want to keep the speckled look rather than risk having too blurry a final print. Many of these old pictures need some cropping, so be sure to scan at a high enough resolution to increase the size of the wanted images. In this instance, the original 3.5" square was scanned at 1200dpi, producing a cropped 5" x 7" print.

Dark Photo Brought to Light

Many times we look through our old photographs and come upon some that are so dark and grainy, and yet it might be the only photo of an individual we have during a certain time frame. Here is an example of just such a photo. Add a bit of damage producing uneven fading and you have what some people erroneously consider "too far gone for restoration." This poor photo turned out to be a wonderful glimpse into the life of a woman raised on the prairie in a sod home. We can almost make out enough detail to confirm she is not standing in front of the "soddy," although for years family members thought that was the case. Amazing what a little restoration work can do for genealogy researchers!!!

Dark and Reddish Photos

This photo was a small, almost unnoticed one tucked into the pages of an aunt's album. My mother-in-law spotted it while we were scanning other items, and said it was her favorite wedding photo of her parents. Of course I had to try to recover this image for her, but it was pretty far gone. We decided a smaller print would be best (shows less imperfections), and scanned the original at about 600dpi, enough to print at double the size of the original photo if we could. With a bit of work she has a decent, if not great, version of this in her hands now, as her sister was the one with the only original. Fortunately we have another, better photo of this couple elsewhere on this blog.