Newbie needs advice on first restore WIP

[brian]

Original


Work In Progress


Hi Everyone!   This is my first restoration and so far I have tried the following with limited success.

   Adjustment levels correction  (not curves)
   Channel mixer for fixing some of the lighter staining
   Clone stamp tool
Used subject's left hand to sample skin tones for cloning
along dark stained forearms
Cloned siding and areas of obvious damage

I am not happy with the effect – looks painted, 
             
Any suggestions or other techniques you may offer are greatly appreciated!

Brian

[Mhayes]

Brian, you are really going to enjoy doing the siding on the house---Not! I don't know how comfortable you are with using layer mask, but if you are there is an easier way than cloning. Rather than doing a Level's Adjustment, I took a look at the channels and decided that I like the red channel the best. I then did a Ctrl All (or Comand All) to get all of the red channel. Then I hit the short cut key for copy Ctrl C, and then went out of channels and back in to the regular layer file and did a Ctrl V which will past the red channel on top. I left the mode at Normal. I would not worry about the need to lighten or darken at this point, but concentrate on the damage.

For me the best way on the siding and even on the man's arm is to use the lasso tool--poloygonal for tracing the straight edges on the siding. I will trace one piece of siding and then do a Ctrl J to copy and then Ctrl V to move that copy over the piece of damaged siding I want to repair. You will need to move the opacity as needed. To make things simple, you could merge down and then do the same for the next piece of siding. The great thing about a layer mask is that if you hold down the Alt key as you pick a layer mask, it will conceal your selection. That will allow you to change your soft brush to white and paint in the parts you like.

On the man's arm, yes, it does look painted and we have all been in that predicament. I would do the same thing as I did on the siding but this time I would use the regular lasso---this time with a 2 pixel feather since you don't want a sharp edge. This may be slowing going at first, but you will build up his arm. When you get the damage fixed, than you can concentrate more on changing the darkness and lightness.

Save your work often and do some "save as" so that you can go back in time if needed.

Margie

P.S. I know everyone is forgetting to see if they are posting personal info on the photos. Look in File>File Info and remove the family's personal information. The other way is to drop your photo into a new file.

[kiska]

Here's one approach for the arms. Needs a lot more fine tuning.

[Mhayes]

Kiska, that looks great!

Margie

[brian]

Next Attempt


I appreciated the comments but working with an old version of Photoshop (6.0.1) makes it difficult to translate the suggestions given.

My workaround for the siding  and the arm–
       Selecting good data, layers via copy plus duplicating layers, alignment with move tool and merging down the layers reduced the amount of cloning.
       Adjustment levels for tone and contrast.
 
Thanks for your help, Margie and Kiska.

This is as good as I think I can get it.

         
Brian

[Hannie]

Brian, what if you copy Kiska's version to your computer and use it as a layer (adjust the size some) over your restore.  Then you can use a hide all layer mask and bring back the (Kiska's) arms?

Hannie

[brian]

Third Attempt


 
Thanks for your help, Hannie.
I reluctantly took your advice (concern about taking another's work) and resized the arm – I think it came out well.   
What's your opinion?
         
Brian

[Hannie]

Brian, don't feel bad about using other volunteer's fixes, we do it all the time! 
There have been restores that were almost impossible to do if it weren't for the input here on the forum.

The Arms now look much more even colored and natural.   
There is one little thing about it that jumps out at me. 
Because of computer problems I can't use my tablet right now so I will try to describe what I see.

The out edge on his left arm (our right) could use a little smoothing along the edge and just a little shadow so it doesn't look like a cutout arm.
Also the little point downwards at his elbow looks funny.

Hope this makes sense!

Hannie

[brian]

I made a few changes to the Image. Some touchup cloning, level adjustment near the lawn chair, some work on the elbow. I have decided to send it in for a Quality Control check ---- Many thanks for all the advice and helpful tips from fellow OPR members. (Margie. Hannie and Kiska) 
         
Brian

[JTJB]

Hi Brian,

I have had a look at your restore, which is coming along great.

Being a very long time user of Photoshop I can remember using version 6 and will still state today that many of the techniques I used then, I still heavily rely upon today.  Hang in there mate and feel free to call upon the forum for help.  Personally I find there is a wealth of knowledge here that money can't buy.  You may wish to look up the work of Ctein and his Photo restoration books that show sound techniques that work with even some o the earliest versions of Photoshop.

A couple of small things immediately stand out to me on the right side between the man's arm and the window and that is a hard edge.  Try making a selection of the panels in the good area of the photo and blend them in on a separate layer.  If they don't line up exactly try transforming the copy layer to suit the line of the panels.

For the left arm the edge still seems a little sharp and may benefit from blurring and burning the edge a little, which will give the perception of skin and dept of field.  (ie so the arm does not appear to be stuck on the background).

Take care, feel free to ask any questions you may have.

JB

[Mhayes]

Hi Brian,

I agree with JB. The other thing that cathes my eye is the siding under the window. It should be the same shade and extend under the window and not be broken. As it is now, it looks like you have a corner to the house when you don't. This will involve masking, don't know if you are comfortable with that?

You're making good progress.

Margie



Siding is not fun!

[brian]

Here is my result  from working on the siding---- I used  several layer masks, blended them together, some cloning,  transforming tool and blurring to take the hard edge off some of my work.

I am learning a lot from fellow forum members who posted and I hope to build my skills here at OPR with more practice in the coming months.

Thanks to all  !!

Brian

[Mhayes]

Brian, big improvement!  :up:

Margie

[Judy]

Kiska's arm is so much better, somehow the arm went downhill again. I wonder if she could give hints on how she got it that good so it doesn't look so cut out.  One could then fiddle with exposure on it.

Judy

[Tess (Tassie D)]

Its definitely a hard one Brian.
I had a play with it using Kiska's arm. I also copied some of the siding from higher up, overlaid and adjusted it to line up with the boards and then darkened to imitate the original shadow. Its only a rough try and I didn't worry about all the damage.