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Scientists have developed a camera that will help restorers accurately repair old paintings and masterpieces. The camera will allow experts to tell the difference between old varnish and other materials, such as paints and binders.
The camera was developed by a team at King’s College London’s Department of Physics. They say that the new technology will revolutionise the restoration of historic works of art through easier identification and greater accuracy.
In short words “this lens is something else”. It’s extremely fast, huge and has a strange focus distance. It was used in Sony CRT Projectors from 1997. I bought it some years ago from a very interesting guy. He had so many more great stuff in his shop and I regret that I did not buy more. It took me some time to find the right opportunity to use that lens. But I think it was worth the waiting. I am glad my friend and former workshop participant Alois Stingl came over with his wonderful ultra-large format camera.
Although there are still a few exceptions and holdouts, the vast majority of movies, cartoons and other cinema and broadcast content today is shot digitally. In the 20th century, though, digital wasn’t really much of a thing. At least, not until we got right to the very end of the century. Most movies and even cartoons back then were created on film or later recorded to film for use in movie theatres.
The problem with film, though, is that it degrades over time. Depending on the material the film’s made of, that degradation can happen quite quickly, too, causing many films to become quite rare. In this video, Norm from Tested takes a visit to see Steve Stanchfield at Blackhawk Films to see how old films – in this case, cartoons by Max Fleischer, animator of Superman, Popeye, Betty Boop and more – are cleaned and restored.
When it comes to cool projects with vintage cameras, Markus Hofstätter is one of the names that immediately come to mind. Many of his portraits were shot on his faithful old Century No.2 camera. However, its bellow started to leak light, and Markus decided it was time to make an effort and repair it.
So, he got to work and restored the 100-year-old beauty. He filmed the whole process and the end result, and if I may say – the ol’ gal looks even better now with its brand new bellow.
I believe we are all aware that pets can make our lives so much better. While in the modern day we have pet clothes, hotels, bakeries, and of course, photo contests, people from 100 years ago weren’t as devoted to their pets as we are today. Or were they?
Mathieu Stern explored a bunch of Victorian-era glass prints. He spent hours in Photoshop and gave them a new life, but he discovered something interesting along the way. It appears that people in these photos thought of their pets as family members just as we do today.
James Berridge of JBColourisation has already demonstrated his impressive restoration and colorization skills. In his recent project, he embarked on a demanding task to make a large chunk of US history more relatable to the 21st-century folks. He restored and colorized 26 presidential portraits. All of those photos that were photographed in black & white now have their restored, colored version.
After he finished the process, James shared a video that, for the first time, shows all US presidents in color. And in another video, he spoke more about his process, the challenges he faced, and why he decided to start this project in the first place.
We’ve seen some pretty epic examples of manual photo restoration and colorization. But there’s now a website that promises equally impressive results. MyHeritage uses neural networks to restore your old photos and give them color. And judging from the examples, it truly does a pretty good job for artificial intelligence.
In a previous blog post, I mentioned I was embarking on a Pelican 1550 repair project. I was looking to buy one, but someone offered the case for free, and I thought it was worth trying to refurbishment.
At worst, I could buy a new case later, and it would cost me nothing other than my time on the refurb. At best, I’d save a couple of hundred dollars on a new case and help recycle something that might have otherwise found its way to the dumps.
Austrian photographer Markus Hofstätter has shared a few of his impressive projects with DIYP so far. His latest project is as always ambitious, unusual, time-consuming, and totally worth the effort.
While walking around a flea market, Markus found a huge 500mm Petzval lens, produced around 1860. It was in a pretty bad condition, but Markus had an idea. He bought this rare gem, restored it, and took some fantastic portraits with it.
Photo restoration and colorization gives new life and new dimension to damaged old photographs. A recent video from James Berridge of JBColourisation shows just how impressive this process can be. He used a heavily damaged diptych of mother and her baby from circa 1903, with the damage splitting the image apart. In his timelapse video, you can see how he fixed it and “reunited” the mother and her child after 116 years.
Udi Tirosh is an entrepreneur, photography inventor, journalist, educator, and writer based in Israel. With over 25 years of experience in the photo-video industry, Udi has built and sold several photography-related brands. Udi has a double degree in mass media communications and computer science.
Alex Baker is a portrait and lifestyle driven photographer based in Valencia, Spain. She works on a range of projects from commercial to fine art and has had work featured in publications such as The Daily Mail, Conde Nast Traveller and El Mundo, and has exhibited work across Europe
Dave Williams is an accomplished travel photographer, writer, and best-selling author from the UK. He is also a photography educator and published Aurora expert. Dave has traveled extensively in recent years, capturing stunning images from around the world in a modified van. His work has been featured in various publications and he has worked with notable brands such as Skoda, EE, Boeing, Huawei, Microsoft, BMW, Conde Nast, Electronic Arts, Discovery, BBC, The Guardian, ESPN, NBC, and many others.
John Aldred is a photographer with over 20 years of experience in the portrait and commercial worlds. He is based in Scotland and has been an early adopter - and occasional beta tester - of almost every digital imaging technology in that time. As well as his creative visual work, John uses 3D printing, electronics and programming to create his own photography and filmmaking tools and consults for a number of brands across the industry.
Dunja Djudjic is a multi-talented artist based in Novi Sad, Serbia. With 15 years of experience as a photographer, she specializes in capturing the beauty of nature, travel, and fine art. In addition to her photography, Dunja also expresses her creativity through writing, embroidery, and jewelry making.
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