Retouching a Black and White Photo

[Anonymous]

Last winter I took a digital photo of a photo that my mother has and would like to know if in Paint Shop Pro I can fix up the washed out sections. If so, what tools would I use. The pic is of 3 of my grandfathers (2 greatgrandfathers and one grandfather), taken around 1920 or so........Don in South Jersey

 

[Anonymous]

I messed with it a bit.

 

[Anonymous]

and am sure it could be better. Get the free sharpening program I mentioned in an earlier post too. I used it as part of the messing with

 

[Anonymous]

take your BURN tool and make the brush rather big. Make Range: Shadows and Exposure about 50% or less. THen just drag it across the picture in the washed out areas until you get it the way you want.
If you have a picture that is too dark or too light. CLick on Control L. A box will come up and you take the left arrow and slide it to the right until it just touches the black area. do the same with the right arrow but go left. Then you take the middle arrow and move it until you have the picture the way you want.
That will not work with yours as it adjusts the whole picture.
When you are finished use Ultra-Sharpen to finish it off. With a little playing, I am sure you can make it much better than I did in a couple minutes.
Make a copy of it before you mess with it. You can always step back under edit or revert back to the original by going to File-Revert.
Good luck

 

[Anonymous]

Or you could use the "levels tool" and combine that with the "Contrast tool" to clean up the photo.
just a tip

 

[Anonymous]

but it does the whole picture at once and if you just want part of it, the burn tool works pretty well. There has to be a bunch of ways to do it but I am sorta limited on my knowlege <img src="/metal/html/grin.gif" border=0 width=15 height=15 alt=":grin">

 

[Anonymous]

You guys are the best, thankyou, that is exactly what I am looking for, time to play now. Thanks again. Don in South Jersey