Good evening from Pennsylvania

steven462 · August 31, 2011, 10:25:11 PM

Hello,

I was accepted into OPR yesterday and I must say that it is an honor to be affiliated with such talented folks. I hope I can measure up.

I wanted to read the handbook and information before I wrote this so as to know more about what and how to do things.

My wife and I have recently moved to PA. from Washington State to be closer to her family (3 months) and we are close to the New York border where she can visit with them in the Elmira, NY area. We have been gone from this neck of the woods for 22 years and felt it was time to get back here.

I have started a small retouching and restoration business from my home and am enjoying every minute of it as I am finally working at something that I have longed for many years now. I have been involved with all aspects of photography since 1963 when I picked up my first "SLR", went digital (DSLR) about 5 years ago. I have been working in photoshop for the last 3 or 4 years now and like the idea of not smelling from hypo or developer anymore (actually my wife likes it better).

I must say that I have been "taken down a peg or two" when I saw the talent of the folks in this organization. I have been wanting to give back and did not know how until I learned about OPR a few years ago and am now in a position (retired) where I can devote some of my energies here.

I am Hoping to get started sometime this weekend.

Thank You,
Steven

Mhayes · August 31, 2011, 10:31:51 PM

Hi Steven,

Welcome to OPR from Kansas. I think you will love doing this and the forum is great for sharing ideas. I think all of us have improved since joining OPR. I can't think of a better place to learn how to restore. Right now you are in for a treat since we really do have some excellent photos to restore. Some of the last one from Nashville were a real challenge.

I was almost afraid to read much further in your post for fear of hearing that your home had been washed away. How do you like your move?

Hope to see more of you on the forum.

Margie

Footnote: On the OPR Handbook, read past the section on PhotoShelter as you will get more recent information on The New Volunteer Welcome Section in the forum.

Hannie · September 01, 2011, 05:35:31 AM

Hi Steven,

Welcome to the forum!
It sounds like you will feel right at home here. There is not a day that I don't learn something new here, I wish I had more time to try out all the suggestions and tips that are posted.

That is great that you have set up a small restoration/retouching business from your home. I have tried for years but as soon as I raised my fee to "above starvation level", no more orders.
Clients don't realize how much work a restoration can be and how many hours are spent pushing pixels.

That is why I appreciate OPR volunteers so much, it is amazing how much work is being done for free. All this time and effort to help out flood victims that have lost so much, what a great bunch!

Hannie

Mike S. · September 01, 2011, 07:08:54 AM

Welcome to OPR Steven,

Your talents will fit in very well with the rest of extremely fine people at OPR. I also just recently retired (01-Aug-11) and jointed OPR. My wife jointed last November. We both love it and I am sure you will too.

Please look in the gallery at the new photos from the flooding in Stark County Ohio. I bet there is at least one damaged photo with your name on it. I encourage you to keep looking at and posting to the Forum, your comments are always welcome on any subject that comes up including the picture posts. I will be posting my first restoration this morning and suggestions for improvement are welcome.

steven462 · September 01, 2011, 12:05:42 PM

Margie

Thank you for the welcome. As to your concern about hurricane Irene affecting us we were very fortunate in that we experienced very little wind (only about 20-30 mph) and rain created a small headache by water getting into the garage. I anticipated that early on and with my wife and I on the shovels we were able to redirect the water flow away and only ended up losing two 10 foot rolls of background paper.

Hannie

What I am doing is charging by the job and in most cases based on their budget because this area has many families going back 150 years or more. There was a terrible flood in 1972 that all but destroyed the city of Elmira and many photos ended up being thrown away. Will I get rich trying to do this. Nahhhh. Will I lose money because of the hours of restoring. Yep. But I want to supplement my social security as well as having the satisfaction of getting those old photos restored. Come to think of I have spent more in advertising then what I have taken in so far.

Mike
Boy, I am beginning to doubt some of my abilities especially after viewing some of the great talent here. I think my main problem is going to be removing the water stains which I have done before, just not on such a large scale. I will be writing to one of the other forums to see how they do it and if there are any tutorials available. The stains I have removed before were usually 1 or 2 colors but not white. I think I have a handle on it but want to try a few for practice before I download anything.

Steven

Mhayes · September 01, 2011, 07:13:32 PM

Hi Steven,

It would be better if you posted your photos on our Forum rather than going to another forum. I'm not knocking other forums as there are some really good ones out there, but you can't beat the expertise and advice that you will get on ours. The other thing is that if you go outside and start using tips that don't follow our guidelines---meaning retouching that changes the original---your final restore may run the risk of getting rejected by Quality Control.

As to writing other forums that is fine, but please only post your photo here. When family's signs a realease they give permission that it will be used by OPR. Stick with us and you will learn a lot about how to restore water damaged photos.

Thanks,

:police:

steven462 · September 01, 2011, 09:59:05 PM

Hi Margie,
I think I may have picked the wrong wording. I did mean to imply going outside of the OPR but the other (now I don't know what to call it) like the threads on easy or medium here at OPR.
Sorry,
Steven

Mhayes · September 01, 2011, 10:29:30 PM

Hi Steven,

Sorry for the confusion and that I misunderstood you---seems to happen a lot. :) Yes, post your photo on one of the threads for the difficulty for your photo. We will help you and give some suggestions. Post the original and the other your progress. Before you post the photo, make sure that you remove the personal info from the photo. In PS, go to File>File Info.

Margie

Johnboy · September 01, 2011, 11:53:39 PM

Steven,

Welcome to OPR from southwest Ohio and from a former Pennsylvanian. When I lived in PA it was in the north western part near the lake.

Don't worry about your expertise compared to other volunteers. That is what makes this organization tick. What one can't handle someone else can. When picking just pick one that you think you can handle. Then go from there. What you learn here can be applied to your business. I too am amazed at how some volunteers pull almost the impossible out of a photo.

Anyway you will be glad you joined. The one rule is there is never a dumb question, and don't be afraid to share your experience when helping some other volunteer. That is how we all learn.

Now a word about the distributors... Nah that can wait. Also check out some of the Tool Bar comments to find out that we are not all business.

Johnboy

Hannie · September 02, 2011, 04:52:10 AM

Johnboy, do you realize that your snide insinuation about the distributors may come back to haunt you one day...

Hannie

Tess (Tassie D) · September 02, 2011, 10:08:29 AM

As usual I'm late to the party. Welcome Steve from the bottom of the world and don't believe a word Johnboy says. He has this thing about spots on photos.

schen · September 02, 2011, 12:43:12 PM

Better late than never. Welcome Steven.

my first restoration was on the furniture. My mentor who was in furniture restoration business before taught me that to do a good job, I should not expect to make money.

About our lovely distributors, Johnboy, could you PM me so that we can organized a union to protect us from them?

Mhayes · September 02, 2011, 12:51:16 PM

I don't know how to break this to you Shujen, but now that you are on the board---you have gone over to the "Dark Side" and you are one of "them." :funny:

Margie

schen · September 02, 2011, 01:44:42 PM

Sorry, Johnboy, you are on your own. :-[

Johnboy · September 03, 2011, 12:48:29 AM

I guess by coming on late I avoided the whip at least for now. That little dude looked mean. As they say if you can't stand the heat get out of the kitchen. The thing is I never really said anything about the distributors. You all just admitted it yourselves. Good job.

Schen, wimp. I think we could have been a good team. You could have been an inside informant and found where that cotton pickin' muck machine is hidden, and saved all of us some agony. :funny:

Johnboy