It’s always a great idea to include family history and stories in small family operated business web sites, and that is what Tobia Construction did on their About Page. But the photo of the owner’s father was a bit rough looking with age, and needed it cleaned up and improved a bit. There were some dusty parts, some specs of dirt, and a lot of fading in areas for me to work on, as you can see by clicking this image for a close-up.

Here is the final result, which I delivered in 4×6 format for reprinting or distribution to other family members – and scaled to a good size for the web page. I intentionally left the vintage look intact, and added a new sepia tone (brownish tint) which would have been appropriate to this time period.

This customer had a photo taken at a trade show, which they wanted improved a bit before adding it to their web site.

I straightened out the photo, cropped it, sharpened details, adjusted the saturation and contrast and removed shiny reflections from their faces. The words on the banner were no longer relevant so I took them off. The middle set of flyers had a irreparable glare so I duplicated and skewed the set from the left. The white piece of paper in front of his hand had too much reflection to be salvaged, so I removed it, painted in more dark suit, added another set of flyers. Lastly, to balance the entire picture, I moved the pamphlets over into a center arrangement. And now they have a good picture for their web site.

Qualifying as one of the more curious things I’ve been asked to do was this project. The young man wanted a photo of himself with George Bush – and asked me to remove the female colleague from the shot. Of course, in the real photo, I didn’t blur any faces but I thought it prudent for the purpose of my gallery. I couldn’t help but wonder what the story was behind this one – other than that her pink top clashes. But I don’t ask questions – it’s usually spouses and exes I’m removing! In hindsight,  I wish I had buttoned both their suit jackets…

This is the original photo:

This is the result: