Photo Editing

I have found that editing photos, particularly repairing and even coloring old photos, to be quite enjoyable. It is so wonderful to have the technology to easily do things such as erase random people out of the background, airbrush blemishes, or even fabricate meetings with famous people. Of course the later comment highlights the growing need to be skeptical about a photo's authenticity.

I primarily use simple tools such as gamma correction to lighten up an underexposed photo, thus revealing a face that had once been covered in the shadows. I notice too often people post images that are too dark to see anything. Please tell such friends to use gamma correction, which most graphics programs have, and it can be free through open source software.

This week I played around with coloring old b&w photos, and discovered that I could get decent results by copying the image to several layers, coloring each layer to the color of the specific area, and then erasing the areas to be colored differently on each respective layer. The results can be seen in two of the images in the below arrangement. (I know I should have "Photo Chopped" my double chin, but I was going for as much authenticity as possible.)