Not sure what to do

[randomeyesight]

I have this image that has damage done to the people in the background and I'm a little perplexed on what to do with this. Do I just find a random person to put in there from a stock image? Do I leave that part of the image unrestored? Any suggestions would be helpful. Thanks.

Original image


My restore image so far... and there is parts of the none people background I'm working on. My main concern is the area that I circled. Thanks.

[glennab]

Hi random

I'm going to post a sketchy example of what I'd do.  The people in the background aren't that important, so I grabbed the head of one of the men seated on our left, did a down-and-dirty job of adding shirt, a beard and a little more hair, and blurred his face.  It appears to me that the woman has her back to us and has red hair, so I pulled color from around her and created the hair.  None of it has to be perfect, just relatively proportionate.  For what it's worth...

Cheers,

GK

[Tess (Tassie D)]

Great job on the restore so far. :up: I'd definitely go with Glenna's sage advice and just recreate the people vaguely as they are just background fill.

[weewood]

I saw this image on the NAPP forums. :cool: I basically would remove the people in question. They don't play a part in the photo. Regards, David

[Charlene5]

Do you remember those "How many hidden items can you find?" drawings from when we were kids?  You had to stop your brain from saying "That's a tree" and examine the "branches" and lines individually to see the hidden ukulele.   This picture is sort of the same thing.  Our eye wants things to be "right" - what we expect to see - and only slows to examine detail if we consciously slow down and look at the detail   Glenna's idea was spot on.  Stick in some shapes that say "head" and "body" to the eye.  They don't have to be perfect.  The viewer's brain will supply the missing detail.  As long as something isn't wrong enough to stop eye movement it passes unnoticed.

That's what my art professor taught me :)

MJ

[Hannie]

Hi Randomeyesight,

I agree with Glenna and MJ, it will look just fine. 
You probably still have to do levels adjustment, there is a drawback to doing those after repairs, it can bring up slight color differences in the areas that you repaired. 
You can prevent it by doing the levels adjustment first.

You have done a great job so far!

Hannie