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Archive for Photo Restoration
We were approached by a global manufacturing company to restore and colourise over 40 historic images they have of their company which they want to display in an forthcoming exhibition.
We get increasing numbers of enquiries to create bespoke images for all sorts of end use.
Here are several examples of the photos that we restored and colourised for them to bring to life the company’s early history.
Over recent months I have been restoring photographs for my customer Irene Boocock. It soon became clear that Irene was working on her memoir for her family and she got in touch when she had finished it by the Christmas deadline to let me have the reactions from the family and herself when it was completed.
Here’s what she sent me:
I have always thought of writing about my early life as a legacy for my children. I regret not asking my mother more questions about her childhood and that I didn’t find out more about the short time my parents had together before he was lost at sea while serving on the Arctic Convoys. Like others considering writing about their life, there were always reasons for me to put this off. However, I finally began preparing notes and tentatively made a start on the first draft. After gathering lots of photographs together to scan onto my writing, I realised I would need help as many were damaged and faded. This is where Richard came into the project, employing his expertise and restoring treasured photographs beautifully. The first one he restored was a very early photograph of myself which had suffered much damage over the years having been folded in half, sellotaped together and with several tears and scratches. I couldn’t believe the transformation Richard achieved and over the next months, there followed more restorations, each one securing a place in the memoir. A very special one was the photograph he created, from two separate images, of my parents as we had never seen one of them together.
I am so pleased with my completed book, happy in the knowledge that my early life is preserved for my children and grandchildren and in the process, I have paid tribute to my parents. There is no doubt that the restored photographs – courtesy of Richard’s dedication and undoubted expertise – add so much to the story of my early life. To anyone thinking about writing a memoir, I would encourage you to make a start as the rewards are so worth the time and effort. At Christmas I gave out copies of my memoir to my family and the response was truly overwhelming. I would also wholeheartedly recommend asking Richard to restore your faded/damaged photographs to enhance and safeguard those frozen precious moments from your past. Good Luck!
This was very gratifying for me to receive and I can only encourage everyone to make the time and take the effort to ask questions of relatives about family history so the stories are not lost forever. I hear this so often “If only I’d asked my parents about their early life and who is in all these old photographs” is something I hear a lot and have actually said myself.
I recently received an order from Iain Anderson from Renfrewshire as he wanted me to produce a montage on canvas of some his photographs taken when he was in various dramatic stage roles.
During our conversations I found that Iain has his own radio show on BBC Scotland and he plays some really great music, much of which you may not have heard before and is well worth hearing, which you can hear again on the BBC iPlayer.
Click on his photograph below for the link to listen
Iain Anderson – BBC Radio Scotland
Last year I was asked by Nigel Bayes to recreate the logo for his vintage fire engine as the original had been painted over and was unusable. Creating all the different elements that went to make up the logo the final image was sent to Nigel in July 2014. I have now received the much anticipated final photographs of the new logo. Below is the original image used as the template and then the finished new logo and in situ on the fire engine.
The artwork for my vintage fire engine which you took so much trouble over for me has now been made into the badges for the doors. Here are some photographs showing the finished product in pride of place which I think you will agree is pretty good thanks to all your effort.
Dennis Vintage Fire Engine Restored Logo
Here is a potted history of the fire engine
1955 Dennis F8 Engine Rolls Royce B60 six cylinder petrol 4.27 litre. The vehicle was ordered from “Dennis Brothers” around March 1955 by the “Ministry of works” and delivered in November. One of three on the order one for H.M Dockyard Malta and two destined for H.M. Dockyard Trincomalee of which mine is one. The two vehicles both worked in the Dockyard probably only for a couple of years as my information is that it was decommissioned after 1957. At that point both vehicles came back by ship to Rosyth Dockyard and the sister vehicle remained there as a first line appliance. Mine was sent to Devonport Dockyard and served as a first line appliance there until 1968. It then found its way overseas yet again to Gibraltar to work as an upper rock machine. It was there until 1976 when it was sold off as ministry surplus by some miracle it returned to GB and a scrapyard within twenty miles or so from where I live. That is where I saw and fell in love with it, I bought it in 1978 with no idea what would be involved. It was in a pretty sad state at that point I didn’t know at the time but the engine had broken pistons/rings and was generally sick. I spent three years restoring the vehicle learning as I went but not having the in depth knowledge that I have acquired over the years. My long suffering wife and the two kids as they came along have rallied the vehicle around the country for many years having the odd year off to do other stuff. The engine gave up the ghost enroute to an event and had to be transported home (I have to say this was the first time in all those years that she failed get us home). This was the catalyst for a second and much more in depth restoration. Restoration two. Remove engine complete strip down. Block bored out new full length liners fitted, new pistons, new bearings, crank ground and polished, new camshaft bearings, line bored, new timing gear, Cylinder Head skimmed, all valves re-cut, new clutch all ancillaries serviced, radiator rebuilt with new core, Flew to Ireland to obtain a serviceable camshaft (that is a whole other complicated story). Whilst the engine was out it provided space to get into the hole it left so a complete chassis clean and repaint. A total rewire all instruments restored, brakes refurbished, fuel tank replaced, cab interior painted and varnished. Finally and by no means least a pretty much bare metal re-spray with two pack and a lacquer finish. State of play just now is that the painting is done apart from three locker doors which have been re-skinned. The first stage compounding has been done and now we wait maybe into the new year for the paint to harden and then final compound and polish. Oh yes and there are twenty four locker door hinges to have their pins removed to separate the two halves for chrome plating. The list above shows the major jobs there is a myriad of smaller tasks which take endless time. It would be fair to say that I have intimate knowledge of every nut bolt washer and rivet on this vehicle and I have ended up as consultant to other owners across the world on various details!
I received a letter from Jackie, her letter said
“Please find enclosed a photo of my dad, which I hope you can restore. My dad died in May 1947 and I was born a month after in June 1947, this photo is all I have of him.”
Here’s the photo I received
Here’s the photograph after restoration followed by Jackie’s email to me when she had received the enlargement
“Dear Richard, Thank you so much for what you did to dads photo, I never knew a photo in that condition could be restored perfectly. I can now get a proper image of what my dad looked like, as I never had the pleasure of knowing him. I have one remaining sister and she was only 7 when he died, she only remembers bits n pieces about dad, it may sound strange but this photo will bring me that much closer to dad, n you have managed to do that for me, n I thank you for that…” Jackie
Below are two separate photographs which I colour matched and cropped to align so that the two resulting canvas enlargements that were each 30” x 20” could be hung next to each other on a gallery landing – and very effective they looks too. Terry can be seen in each picture!
Here’s the two original photographs
The all-new Photographs Forever website went live at the end of February with more simple navigation as well as the ability to download your own scanned images directly to me for restoration,evaluation or even just an opinion.
Thanks to Grant at Profitable Websites for his help to put it all together. (www.profitablewebsites.co.uk)
If you can’t find what you’re looking for or have any suggestions as to how this website could be improved, I’d love to hear from you.
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