Digitising Old Slides (part 3)
24th June 2021
In part three of this series about digitising old family slides I am going to have a look at how the images were edited in photoshop after having had a basic edit in Lightroom.
There are three or four things I use Photoshop for with these images. Sharpening, spot and scratch healing, light levels and (possibly) hue and saturation.
When the images are imported into Lightroom it is noticeable that they are slightly soft so I apply a small amount of sharpening to them in Photoshop. Unfortunately this website software is not really up to demonstrating that as it compresses my images so you’ll just have to take my word for it!
However, it is possible to show the before and after of spot removal if we look at this slide taken at Montreux Railway Station in 1982. It's not a very exciting image but it allows me to show the process. The first image shows the slide after I have washed it and then imported it into Lightroom.
The second image shows the dots that are dirt on the slide that didn’t come off even when I had washed it with water.
The third image shows the dots have vanished as I start to use the healing brush.
The final image is the whole slide. It was originally in colour but time had not been kind to this shot so it works better after converting it to black and white.
Once I have applied a light adjustment to levels to add a little contrast and, in the case of a colour image, played around with hue and saturation, I save the image back into Lightroom. Then it’s a case of filing it in the appropriate folder with a title so that anyone looking through them in the future will have an idea where they are and who they depict. Access to my memory won’t be around forever!
It’s a huge task as there are thousands of slides to go through. Much time has been spent this month simply going through boxes of sides and binning most of them. Even when it’s a niceish image there’s really no point keeping it if I have no idea where or what it is.
Another thing I’ve been up to is recommissioning some old cameras. Some mine, some my Dad’s and some my Brother’s. I think I might show some of them in my blog next month.
Thanks for reading this time round, hopefully see you again in July!
There are three or four things I use Photoshop for with these images. Sharpening, spot and scratch healing, light levels and (possibly) hue and saturation.
When the images are imported into Lightroom it is noticeable that they are slightly soft so I apply a small amount of sharpening to them in Photoshop. Unfortunately this website software is not really up to demonstrating that as it compresses my images so you’ll just have to take my word for it!
However, it is possible to show the before and after of spot removal if we look at this slide taken at Montreux Railway Station in 1982. It's not a very exciting image but it allows me to show the process. The first image shows the slide after I have washed it and then imported it into Lightroom.
The second image shows the dots that are dirt on the slide that didn’t come off even when I had washed it with water.
The third image shows the dots have vanished as I start to use the healing brush.
The final image is the whole slide. It was originally in colour but time had not been kind to this shot so it works better after converting it to black and white.
Once I have applied a light adjustment to levels to add a little contrast and, in the case of a colour image, played around with hue and saturation, I save the image back into Lightroom. Then it’s a case of filing it in the appropriate folder with a title so that anyone looking through them in the future will have an idea where they are and who they depict. Access to my memory won’t be around forever!
It’s a huge task as there are thousands of slides to go through. Much time has been spent this month simply going through boxes of sides and binning most of them. Even when it’s a niceish image there’s really no point keeping it if I have no idea where or what it is.
Another thing I’ve been up to is recommissioning some old cameras. Some mine, some my Dad’s and some my Brother’s. I think I might show some of them in my blog next month.
Thanks for reading this time round, hopefully see you again in July!
Comments
By Farnz: Hi David, nicely described and the b&w treatment really adds a sense of timelessness.
If you wanted to remove the blue colour cast and retain a colour copy then I'd recommend doing it in Photoshop's L-A-B colour space because you can manipulate the colours without affecting the luminance/exposure of the slide(s). Not something I could describe here but if you are interested drop me a PM in LUF and I'll explain what I mean.
Keep up the great work! Cheers, Pete.