The photograph has about every flaw imaginable — discoloration, stains, scratches. The faces of the Vietnamese children are covered in blue ink, horns are scrawled on each of their heads.
But the battered print is the only image Bob Paine’s co-worker has of his family. He’s relying on Paine to salvage the photo, to remove the imperfections that came with roughly 40 years of wear and tear — and in this case, war.
“It’s going to take some tricks. I’ll have to pull everything out of the hat on that one,” Paine said of the challenging task before him that, so far, remains on his “long-term projects” list. “No one else would touch it.”
For the past five years, Paine has been scanning and using software on his home computer to retouch and restore old photographs for family, friends and co-workers.
It’s not uncommon for individuals to come to him clinging to just one remaining photograph of their relatives.
“I get that all the time,” he says.
A few clicks of the mouse and Paine’s computer screen zeros in on a problem area — in this case, a series of cracks that cut through the sky and trees in the background of an old photo of his own mother and family. Instinctively, he begins manipulating the computer tools with his mouse, erasing imperfections as he goes. In many cases, Paine may work several hours to clean up a shot before an improved version is ready to be printed.
Computer programs allow you to change a scanned photo’s contrast or brightness — to deepen or richen the color and highlights — or to enlarge a faded wallet-size snapshot (maybe one that’s been carried in someone’s back pocket for 50 years) into a more polished 5-by-7 portrait.
Perfection is always the goal, but that doesn’t mean Paine wants the finished product to come out looking like a brand-new snapshot.
“When I do restoration, I want to keep it of the era … so you look at it and say, ‘That’s an old picture’ and not just something that’s redone. I’d rather have it looking like it’s still old,” Paine said. “That’s why I don’t go out and buy glossy paper.”
Most of the photos Chuck Mastronardi has restored came from his 84-year-old mother-in-law, Florence Mathieson. One clearly dated portrait shows Mathieson as a toddler holding a toy truck next to her older sister. Both are dressed in handmade dresses with lace-up boots. The original is cracked and missing a corner.
Another shows Mathieson as a teenager, but a series of thick, white creases run straight through her face, just below the nose. In the restored version — now framed — there’s no trace of the creases.
“I’ll do work for people because I know what pictures mean to people. Pictures are very personal,” said Mastronardi, 61, who — like Paine — uses Adobe Photoshop to refinish photos on his home computer.
Both Paine and Mastronardi are self-taught photo refinishers who began simply by experimenting. Neither has a job that relates to their hobby — but they both have always had a fondness for photographs. It’s what motivates them to spend hour upon hour to get a photo just right. In some cases, the difference between the “before” and “after” examples is almost remarkable.
Mastronardi was able to produce a rather large print from a 1-by-1-inch shot of his wife’s father, Sgt. Ed Mathieson, cut from a large group photo of Mathieson and his military peers.
“The more resolution you use to scan something, the better it comes out,” he said, explaining how increasing the number of dots per inch allows such enlargements.