Photoshop Restoration & Retouching : Reader's Gallery

I hope you are inspired by the book Photoshop Restoration & Retouching and that you would like to share your work with other reader's. Show us how you've taken the techniques in the book and gone further with them. If you send me before and after files (please keep them small, 1 MB in total) of the retouched image I'll post them here in the Reader's Gallery.

Some of the examples are image roll-overs. Please mouse over an image to see the before and after.

Hi Katrin,

My name is Kevin and I've been "playing around" with Photoshop for many years. The digital photography bug bit me, quite hard, about 4 years ago. I'm currently shooting a Nikon D1H with an assortment of lenses from a 20-35 Tokina to the Nikon 600 F4 (Ouch $$$)! Anyway, your book was mentioned in an Epson newsgroup as a great source of photographic rather than graphic arts info. I consider it's purchase to be money VERY WELL spent. My main interest is in bird photography, attached are a before & after using the fill flash technique from your book. These are uncropped and show how well the technique works.

Kevin K. Gallagher
Stonetower Photo
kkg@callnet.com
www.stonetowerphoto.bizland.com

Hello Katrin,

I have just finished reading your book "Photoshop Restoration and Retouching" an excellent book stuffed with every technique anybody could wish for. I have learned so much from this book it is unbelievable. I knew that I wanted to do restoration work before but after reading your book I definitely want to pursue this as a career. I think that the best part of restoring an image of someones loved one is watching the reaction on their face when you show them the picture after it is fully restored :)

Many Thanks!
Ryan

Ann Martin created a wonderful example of background removal and simplification, which concentrates the viewer's eye on the actual subject of the image.

Hello Katrin,

Have really been enjoying your Photoshop Restoration book, which I received a few days ago. I'm a self-taught digital photographer and image manipulator.The attached photo with the distracting background was posted on a discussion list for Havanese dogs. I thought it would be better if the distractions were eliminated. While the job is less than perfect, the dog's owner was thrilled with it and placed it on her webpage as the top photo! (www.silkydog.dk)

I am retired and only do this as a hobby, but I derive immense pleasure from the "oohs" and "ahs" of appreciation for my efforts. Thank YOU for providing this excellent guide to help me move on to higher levels!

Isabel Cutler

Here is a wonderful example of image restoration. Owen L - the reader - is new to Photoshop and this is his first stab at restoring an image. I've been quite surprised by the number of animal picture restorations readers have shared with me...ok I admit it - I'm a dog person!

Below is an image that Terrie LaBarbera has been working on with Adobe Photoshop and Painter. The work she has done on Max's eyes is especially interesting. As Terrie explains, "On the left is the original scan, note Max's eyes and the color cast. The image was scanned at 600dpi at 150%. The original image was a small photo (2.2 x 2.9 inches) so scanning at 150% gave me a bit more image to work with."

Below is a close up of Max's eyes. As Terrie continues, "I was having a terrible time trying to recreate Max's eyes when I received the April 2001 issue of Maximum PC which is not normally a place I look for graphic tips but the technique they outlined worked quite well. I've listed the steps I followed. Note, all work was done at 600 dpi and I'm PC based so the Photoshop shortcuts are the Windows ones."

Recreating Max's Eyes with Photoshop

Use the Magic Wand to get the bad pupil portion of one eye (very often what you will have is the more classic 'redeye' in the pupil area). You may need to play around with the tolerance setting, I used 20 to get all the white of the pupil and I had 'contiguous' check marked so I didn't inadvertently select more than what I really wanted.

Hold the shift key and click again in the other eye.

Feather (Select > Feather or ctrl-alt-d) 2 pixels.

Save the selections (Select > Save Selection or right click and choose 'save selection') naming it "both pupils"

Desaturate the Image (Image > Adjust > Desaturate or ctrl-shift-u)

With black as your foreground color, use the Airbrush tool, at about 20% opacity to paint the area you've just selected. Choose a brush size that is just about the same size as the area you selected (I used a 35-pixel brush).

Placing the airbrush off center of the selection, click a few times working around the selection to get a kind of feathered edge as close to black as you can--this forms the pupil of the eye, then I clicked once, centering the airbrush in the selected area. Repeat on the other eye. Here's what it should look like.

Deselect (Select > Deselect or ctrl-d)

Using the Lasso tool, select the entire iris, feather 3 pixels (in Photoshop 6, you can do that in one step by setting "feather" to 3 in the in the tool bar), hold the shift key and select the other eye remembering to save and name the selection (Select > Save Selection or right click and choose "save selection")

Put the selection on a new layer Layer > New > Layer via copy or ctrl-J) and name the new layer (alt-double click on the layer)

Colorize using Hue/Saturation (Image > Adjust > Hue/Saturation or ctrl-u) with 'colorized' checked. I used Hue=209, Saturation=28, Lightness=-22. Here's what they look like. Note that in Photoshop, the background would be the standard gray/white checkerboard as it would be transparent and I've surrounded the image by a black border to set it off...otherwise the eyes would just float disembodied on this page.

12. Deselect (Select > Deselect or ctrl-d)

13. Add a new layer (Layer > New > Layer or ctrl-shift-n) and name it (alt-double click on the layer) to add highlights. This is the tricky bit. I used the Airbrush tool at about 10% opacity with the color white, and a small soft painting brush.

14. You can use the opacity setting on the layers palette to play with both the eyes layer and the highlight layer.


I hope you are inspired by the book Photoshop Restoration & Retouching and that you would like to share your work with other reader's. Show us how you've taken the techniques in the book and gone further with them. If you send me before and after files (please keep them small, 1 MB in total) of the retouched image I'll post them here in the Reader's Gallery. Some of the examples are image roll-overs. Please mouse over an image to see the before and after.

Hi Katrin, My name is Kevin and I've been "playing around" with Photoshop for many years. The digital photography bug bit me, quite hard, about 4 years ago. I'm currently shooting a Nikon D1H with an assortment of lenses from a 20-35 Tokina to the Nikon 600 F4 (Ouch $$$)! Anyway, your book was mentioned in an Epson newsgroup as a great source of photographic rather than graphic arts info. I consider it's purchase to be money VERY WELL spent. My main interest is in bird photography, attached are a before & after using the fill flash technique from your book. These are uncropped and show how well the technique works. Kevin K. Gallagher Stonetower Photo kkg@callnet.com www.stonetowerphoto.bizland.com
Hello Katrin, I have just finished reading your book "Photoshop Restoration and Retouching" an excellent book stuffed with every technique anybody could wish for. I have learned so much from this book it is unbelievable. I knew that I wanted to do restoration work before but after reading your book I definitely want to pursue this as a career. I think that the best part of restoring an image of someones loved one is watching the reaction on their face when you show them the picture after it is fully restored :) Many Thanks! Ryan



Ann Martin created a wonderful example of background removal and simplification, which concentrates the viewer's eye on the actual subject of the image.

Hello Katrin, Have really been enjoying your Photoshop Restoration book, which I received a few days ago. I'm a self-taught digital photographer and image manipulator.The attached photo with the distracting background was posted on a discussion list for Havanese dogs. I thought it would be better if the distractions were eliminated. While the job is less than perfect, the dog's owner was thrilled with it and placed it on her webpage as the top photo! (www.silkydog.dk) I am retired and only do this as a hobby, but I derive immense pleasure from the "oohs" and "ahs" of appreciation for my efforts. Thank YOU for providing this excellent guide to help me move on to higher levels! Isabel Cutler


Here is a wonderful example of image restoration. Owen L - the reader - is new to Photoshop and this is his first stab at restoring an image. I've been quite surprised by the number of animal picture restorations readers have shared with me...ok I admit it - I'm a dog person!
Below is an image that Terrie LaBarbera has been working on with Adobe Photoshop and Painter. The work she has done on Max's eyes is especially interesting. As Terrie explains, "On the left is the original scan, note Max's eyes and the color cast. The image was scanned at 600dpi at 150%. The original image was a small photo (2.2 x 2.9 inches) so scanning at 150% gave me a bit more image to work with."

Below is a close up of Max's eyes. As Terrie continues, "I was having a terrible time trying to recreate Max's eyes when I received the April 2001 issue of Maximum PC which is not normally a place I look for graphic tips but the technique they outlined worked quite well. I've listed the steps I followed. Note, all work was done at 600 dpi and I'm PC based so the Photoshop shortcuts are the Windows ones."

Recreating Max's Eyes with Photoshop Use the Magic Wand to get the bad pupil portion of one eye (very often what you will have is the more classic 'redeye' in the pupil area). You may need to play around with the tolerance setting, I used 20 to get all the white of the pupil and I had 'contiguous' check marked so I didn't inadvertently select more than what I really wanted. Hold the shift key and click again in the other eye. Feather (Select > Feather or ctrl-alt-d) 2 pixels. Save the selections (Select > Save Selection or right click and choose 'save selection') naming it "both pupils" Desaturate the Image (Image > Adjust > Desaturate or ctrl-shift-u) With black as your foreground color, use the Airbrush tool, at about 20% opacity to paint the area you've just selected. Choose a brush size that is just about the same size as the area you selected (I used a 35-pixel brush). Placing the airbrush off center of the selection, click a few times working around the selection to get a kind of feathered edge as close to black as you can--this forms the pupil of the eye, then I clicked once, centering the airbrush in the selected area. Repeat on the other eye. Here's what it should look like. Deselect (Select > Deselect or ctrl-d) Using the Lasso tool, select the entire iris, feather 3 pixels (in Photoshop 6, you can do that in one step by setting "feather" to 3 in the in the tool bar), hold the shift key and select the other eye remembering to save and name the selection (Select > Save Selection or right click and choose "save selection") Put the selection on a new layer Layer > New > Layer via copy or ctrl-J) and name the new layer (alt-double click on the layer) Colorize using Hue/Saturation (Image > Adjust > Hue/Saturation or ctrl-u) with 'colorized' checked. I used Hue=209, Saturation=28, Lightness=-22. Here's what they look like. Note that in Photoshop, the background would be the standard gray/white checkerboard as it would be transparent and I've surrounded the image by a black border to set it off...otherwise the eyes would just float disembodied on this page. 12. Deselect (Select > Deselect or ctrl-d) 13. Add a new layer (Layer > New > Layer or ctrl-shift-n) and name it (alt-double click on the layer) to add highlights. This is the tricky bit. I used the Airbrush tool at about 10% opacity with the color white, and a small soft painting brush. 14. You can use the opacity setting on the layers palette to play with both the eyes layer and the highlight layer.