From roots-in@roots-l.rootsweb.com Tue Aug 8 11:18:57 2006 Received: from mail.rootsweb.com (mail.rootsweb.com [192.168.65.34]) by admin.rootsweb.com (8.12.8/8.12.8) with ESMTP id k78HIvjb024586; Tue, 8 Aug 2006 11:18:57 -0600 Received: from roots-l.rootsweb.com (roots-l.rootsweb.com [66.43.16.22]) by mail.rootsweb.com (8.13.4/8.13.4) with ESMTP id k78HItYu010440 for ; Tue, 8 Aug 2006 11:18:55 -0600 Received: from roots-l.rootsweb.com (roots-l [127.0.0.1]) by roots-l.rootsweb.com (8.12.10/8.12.10) with ESMTP id k78EdeFI016773 for ; Tue, 8 Aug 2006 10:39:40 -0400 Received: (from roots-in@localhost) by roots-l.rootsweb.com (8.12.10/8.12.8/Submit) id k78Edefa016772 for roots-approved@rootsweb.com; Tue, 8 Aug 2006 10:39:40 -0400 Received: from lists5.rootsweb.com (lists5.rootsweb.com [66.43.27.41]) by roots-l.rootsweb.com (8.12.10/8.12.10) with SMTP id k78CABFI016407 for ; Tue, 8 Aug 2006 08:10:11 -0400 Received: (from slist@localhost) by lists5.rootsweb.com (8.12.8/8.12.8) id k78EnENe025729 for roots-in@roots-l.rootsweb.com; Tue, 8 Aug 2006 08:49:14 -0600 X-Envelope-From: rockydan@cebridge.net Tue Aug 8 08:49:14 2006 Received: from mail.rootsweb.com (mail.rootsweb.com [192.168.65.34]) by admin.rootsweb.com (8.12.8/8.12.8) with ESMTP id k78EnEjb025720 for ; Tue, 8 Aug 2006 08:49:14 -0600 Received: from mxo1.broadbandsupport.net (mxo1.broadbandsupport.net [209.55.3.81]) by mail.rootsweb.com (8.13.4/8.13.4) with ESMTP id k78En6XQ022278 for ; Tue, 8 Aug 2006 08:49:06 -0600 Received: from cebridge.net (unknown [24.32.133.211]) by mxo1.broadbandsupport.net (Postfix) with ESMTP id F411D31427F; Tue, 8 Aug 2006 10:48:39 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: <44D8A443.7050302@cebridge.net> Date: Tue, 08 Aug 2006 09:48:35 -0500 From: Dan Brennan User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Win98; en-US; rv:1.0.2) Gecko/20021120 Netscape/7.01 X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: ROOTS-L@rootsweb.com, khigh@wi.rr.com References: <200608080415.k784FtCj022326@lists5.rootsweb.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-broadbandsupport.net-MailScanner-Information: Please contact the ISP for more information X-broadbandsupport.net-MailScanner: Found to be clean X-broadbandsupport.net-MailScanner-From: rockydan@cebridge.net X-Spam-Status: No X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang 2.52 on 192.168.65.34 X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang 2.52 on 192.168.65.34 Sender: roots-in@roots-l.rootsweb.com Subject: [ROOTS-L] Tintypes I have a number of very dark photos which scan poorly. First scan the photo Save as .TIF if possible, otherwise as .JPG Open the photo in an imaging program. I use Photoshop LE, Photoshop elements or Corel Photo House Open the IMAGE (or similar) menu click on ADJUST then click on BRIGHTNESS/CONTRAST and allow PREVIEW Then you have to experiment. I usually increase the brightness a little bit (move slider to the right) then increase the contrast a bunch more. Preview. You may want to move the two controls back and forth to get the best picture. Save with a new name with the .TIF ending -- I usually use the same name, adding V2 at the end so I know which is the original and which is the changed one. The JPG format is called a "lossy:" format. that means that it loses some definition every time you mess with it. TIF is not a lossy format and retains the original definition even after you change it. I just blew up a small portion of a dark photo to concentrate on people on a porch. After messing a bit I got a halfway decent image of the 6 people. It's not like a close-up, well-exposed film image, but it does show the people a lot better than the original. You just have to keep messing around until you get a better looking picture.