The Catalina Islander, a local newspaper in California, hired me to restore and color tint this vintage photo to use for a July 4th edition. A reader had provided the photo, which featured his mother, on the left, as a young woman.

After I got past the initial puzzle of how the drummer was staying upright without a tow rope, in a day and age where Photoshop was non existent, I started by cleaning up some minor degradation and spotting. Then I adjusted the contrast in places that were dark but still needed color, like the flag’s stripes. The client provided some input into the colors to use, and I chose others that seemed appropriate. After a number of revisions, the new version looked like it had been tinted the way it was done by hand in the old days of photography – using Photoshop. This is the final result:

Anna Leach was a prominent president of Emma Willard School in Troy NY. The school has a beautiful “hall of presidents” with portraits and photos of each person who has been president there – but had none of Miss Leach.  I was contacted when they found a small old photo in an archive, and asked if I could restore it to a painting sized portrait.

The original photo had been printed on newsprint so this is what it looked like up close.

In the end, I was successful – using a great many techniques to smooth and clarify the texture in the photo, and filters to give it a painterly quality, the tiny original was able to be blown up to 16″x20″. I arranged to have it printed on archival quality photo paper, and delivered it to the school to be framed and displayed – restoring Anna Leach to her rightful place in the Hall of Presidents.