Retouching venetian blind shadows

[keith_buell1]

I took some wonderful 35 mm B&W photos of my 6 month old daughter

with TMX. Unfortunately, I didn't realize that the shadows of the

venetian blinds in the room would cast such prominent "zebra stripes"

across the pictures. They weren't visible at all at the time, or at

least I didn't really notice them. Is this correctable digitally

without too much loss of quality? My original plan in taking the

photos was to make 11x14 enlargements on fiber paper to have them

framed. The photos are very sharp, having used my Canon 100m macro

lens, so I'm not concerned about loss of sharpness in an enlargement

that big. But I've been out of touch with digital retouching since I

left my job as a graphic designer in 1997. What quality can I expect

from a lab that would do this, and how would the print compare to a

fiber print from the negative?

 

Thanks for any advice. Also, if anyone can recommend a service in

the Washington, DC, area to do this, I'd appreciate it.

[keith_buell1]

Here is one of the pictures.<div></div>

[steven_muller]

black and white is an old school lab in arlington, they do phenominal work. they could

probably do the rerouching in the lab, as opposed to digitally

 

http://www.google.com/local?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF

-8&safe=off&q=black+and+white&near=Arlington,+VA&radius=0.0&latlng=38870833,

-77101388,38892754,-77080963&oi=locald

[ted_kaufman]

Actually, I think you should leave the shadows in there. They are not intrusive and actually add a pleasant texture.

 

On the other hand, it would be easy enough to retouch out all the blind's shadows, though I'm sure it will be fairly costly. Yet another alternative is to reshoot and pay closer attention to the light.

[keith_buell1]

Thanks for the responses. Reshooting is not an option as these were taken several months ago, and I I captured the moment in a way that obviously cannot be repeated in the same way.

 

The stripes in this photo are the least prominent of any of the pictures--I attached it not necessarily because it iw the one I'd want retouched but because I already had a scan handy on my computer.

[scott_warn]

These problems can be corrected digitally but it will take a pro to do it. By careful masking and rebalancing the brightness values a pro can have these images looking perfect. The major issue is finding one who really knows what they are doing because a hack will say that he did the best that could be done. It may also entail about 4 to 6 hours of work on each image to get an absolutely perfect result, and that could get very expensive. I am NOT a pro at doing this kind of work, I have had some success working on my own images, but I have spent as much as 30 hours on one image. It lets me know that it can be done, it also tells me that it will be very time consuming.

 

Finding a pro who can do this kind of work won't be easy, try checking with the professional printing labs the the local photographers use. If they can't do it "in House" they may be able to direct you to someone who can do the work.

 

Also, if you want to preserve all the detail possible you may need to have the film drum scanned at 6000 dpi, using a standard film scanner at 4000 dpi will lose a tiny bit of detail. That is, however, all theory and in practical terms probably isn't necessary. Now the big question, what is your vision corrected? If it's only 20/40 scanning the negs at 2700 dpi will work quite well for an 11 x 14 print which means a 6 mp image. It's only those who are fortunate enough to have 20/15 or better vision who can see all of the detail that TMX can produce on an 11 x 14 print. Those with 20/10 vision will need the 6000 dpi scan, if your average at 20/40, you don't need the super high resolution because you can't see it. Keep in mind that if you are unwilling to give up a bit of fine detail in the final print it will drive the cost up. If your vision can't see every bit of the detail that TMX can deliver, why pay for it?

[steven_muller]

check

[joe_dahlgren]

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