Old Photographs are Treasures
Monday, May 22, 2006
Old Photographs.
Old photographs need to be digitized and archived. The paper prints are too easily lost or damaged.
Mother’s old photo album has been converted to digitized versions and consigned to CD rom. Copies of this have been distributed to living relatives: A hedge against total loss.
I discovered some time ago that many pictures were missing from mother’s old black paged album. The little black corner tabs were there on some pages, but the photographs were gone. Finally it came to me what was missing. Any picture that included my father was gone. Either mother or step-dad Bob had carefully removed them and now they were lost forever to the curious generations following.
I finally found a picture of my dad in the back of my baby book. Another here and there turned up. So there are a total of six pictures left of my father, Gerald Edward.
I carefully preserved these six on disk.
Sad that there is so little left of him.
Preserving old photographs brings some interesting thinking. Today it is all too easy to correct, augment or repair an old photograph. Sometimes it helps the photo sometimes not. It seems that preserving the photograph the way it looks when you found it deepens the value of it. The scratches, fading and rips seem to be battle scars the photo has earned. These flaws seem to contribute to the aura of an old photo.
If a person simply must tinker with the contrast or the saturation of an ancient photograph, maybe a side by side comparison is the way to display it. The viewer can make their own decision as to how to interpret it, or which version is the most valuable.
I don’t know.
But, sometimes a photo just begs to be restored a bit. Hm. Maybe that’s the answer: Restoration to a degree that does not destroy the obvious age of the document. Maybe a bit of enhancement here and there isn’t out of line. Or maybe not.
Here is a comparison of two photographs from a friend on Flickr. I couldn’t resist “fixing” it. Does it lose its authenticity? Does restoring the color take away from the charm of an aging snapshot?
Old Photographs.
Old photographs need to be digitized and archived. The paper prints are too easily lost or damaged.
Mother’s old photo album has been converted to digitized versions and consigned to CD rom. Copies of this have been distributed to living relatives: A hedge against total loss.
I discovered some time ago that many pictures were missing from mother’s old black paged album. The little black corner tabs were there on some pages, but the photographs were gone. Finally it came to me what was missing. Any picture that included my father was gone. Either mother or step-dad Bob had carefully removed them and now they were lost forever to the curious generations following.
I finally found a picture of my dad in the back of my baby book. Another here and there turned up. So there are a total of six pictures left of my father, Gerald Edward.
I carefully preserved these six on disk.
Sad that there is so little left of him.
Preserving old photographs brings some interesting thinking. Today it is all too easy to correct, augment or repair an old photograph. Sometimes it helps the photo sometimes not. It seems that preserving the photograph the way it looks when you found it deepens the value of it. The scratches, fading and rips seem to be battle scars the photo has earned. These flaws seem to contribute to the aura of an old photo.
If a person simply must tinker with the contrast or the saturation of an ancient photograph, maybe a side by side comparison is the way to display it. The viewer can make their own decision as to how to interpret it, or which version is the most valuable.
I don’t know.
But, sometimes a photo just begs to be restored a bit. Hm. Maybe that’s the answer: Restoration to a degree that does not destroy the obvious age of the document. Maybe a bit of enhancement here and there isn’t out of line. Or maybe not.
Here is a comparison of two photographs from a friend on Flickr. I couldn’t resist “fixing” it. Does it lose its authenticity? Does restoring the color take away from the charm of an aging snapshot?
posted by anyjazz @ 1:13 PM
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