An opinion... for what its worth.

[Handypandy]

I am posting this here as I think its more relevant to this section. I've only been on this site a few days, so forgive me if I am repeating what may have been said before, but I feel its quite important.

Whilst I love the restoration and colouring of old pics, I feel it is important to view them along with the originals and not instead of them. These days, because it is so easy, we tend to crop, manipulate etc to the max, sometimes oblivious to the fact that we might be destroying some of the most vital (in the future) bits of information. I'll give you an example:

A few months ago, my 63 year old younger brother (yes I'm an old duffer), dug out some 35mm slides that were taken in our youth and had been forgotten about in a loft for nearly half a century. They had suffered a bit, but nevertheless to us.... they were gold-dust. The photos were not particularly artistic but.... and this is my point... it was not the main subject matter that was the most interesting, but the stuff in the background that evoked so many memories. The curtains... the tiles... the radiogram... the furniture....the car...the building in the background, long since gone...the clues to where it was actually taken.. etc etc.... all stuff we would probably crop out today. So thats my four penneth....Look after the originals !!

And thanks for being such a welcoming bunch!!

[jim1]

It is a topic that's been mentioned before. We don't alter the originals the poster usually has those. We repair copies.
Many we get on here are in a shocking state & it's only by repairing them that they become viewable.
I'm pretty sure the owner doesn't throw the originals away once we've supplied them with repairs.

[Handypandy]

Sorry, I wasn't very clear... Obviously photos uploaded here are copies by definition. I'm thinking more of photos that are more recent, that we hope future generations might enjoy. The ones where we crop or blur out what we perceive to be extraneous dross in the image, which in essence, may be anything but. The photos to which I referred, being a case in point.
Its possibly not a topic for this forum, but viewing the old photographs just brought it home to me.

[Treetotal]

On here we only repair very old photos as images of living people are not allow here for privacy reasons.

 When people post their photos for repair, it is sometimes necessary to use a bit of creativity and imagination to replace missing parts and make the photo whole. Where possible...we try to stay as close as we can to the original, and the onus is on the owner of the photo to make notes that the photo has been repaired, especially if they have been sent a copy by a Family member.
 
We often colour photos on request with no real knowledge of the true colouring of the sitter so it is the owner's responsibility to make a note to that effect.

On the subject of more recent photos, I would always keep the extraneous details in, the exception being when a person is no longer associated with the sitter, for instance, an old boy/girlfriend.
So I would agree in principle to keeping the origin details in.

Carol

[stevew101]

As has already been said, the original should never be detroyed or overwritten.

All restores or improvements are only a copy of the original

Some pictures that are posted on here are in a terrible condition, and unless restored will continue to deteriorate until at some point they will no longer exist for future generations  Restoring them before its too late ensures that they continue to be viewable to our descendents

With regards to colour tinting, many people like to have an idea of how their ancestors would have looked in real life rather than grayscale.  Tinting is always the subjective view of the restorer, and the colours are always best guess based on the greyscale tones.

With recent photos, sometimes people will want someone removed who is just part of the background and unknown to them, or maybe an ex partner.  Although I can understand the reasoning behind that, it does signal a warning to future generations of researchers, who may quite understandably accept that the picture is an original and therefore is an accurate representation when in fact it is not.

I would always endorse the comment above "Look after the originals" if you have them.

Steve

[Handypandy]

Thanks for the replies, patently my written English is not what it once was...lol.