Is this scan crooked?

[francis_dantuono]

<p>Or am I being overly critical? I didn't scan it, someone else did for me.<br>

<img src="https://i.imgsafe.org/a4fb93d700.jpg" alt="" width="1354" height="1080" /></p>

[JosvanEekelen]

<p>Hard to say without the original. Highlights don't seem to have any detail. Color is a bit blue/greenish. Is the original Kodachrome? In that case it needs a bit of tweaking anyway.</p>

[francis_dantuono]

<p>The original is a Polaroid. Circa 1967. This is a restored version of a scanned photo. What do you mean the highlights don't seem to have any detail?</p>

[francis_dantuono]

<p>Here was another scan done by myself years ago. This was without any touchups done.<br>

<img src="https://i.imgsafe.org/a64d741000.jpg" alt="" width="1299" height="1080" /></p>

[JDMvW]

<blockquote>

<p>What do you mean the highlights don't seem to have any detail?</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Just that. The whites are overexposed and almost all trace of details like folds and buttons are simply washed out. That could well be the case with the original, and not the scanning.<br>

The image as a whole is just a little tilted, but it's definitely not a problem.<br>

Here is an effort to get a little more detail in the highlights, but not much can be done to it, honestly.</p><div></div>

[francis_dantuono]

<p>Yes - the original print is actually even worse than the first scan in terms of the overexposure. The first scan was an attempt to increase the highlights. Also, I'm not sure if the tilting was because of the scan or because the Polaroid was a little bent/curled when scanned. It appears the right side is bigger than the left. Do you think I should get it re-scanned, or is the tilt subtle enough so as not to be jarring?</p>

[Colin O]

Crooked? Just rotate the image in software. Re-scanning is unnecessary.

[john_wheeler6]

<p>Answering the first question yes the image is crooked. Vertical can be pretty easily determined by the flag pole and the evergreens trees which typically are vertical. <br>

<br />Here is my take on the image:<br>

<img src="https://photos.smugmug.com/photos/i-wTSVsLc/0/O/i-wTSVsLc.jpg" alt="" /></p>

[Robin Smith]

<p>It's difficult to tell if the image is tilted or not. Whether the flag pole should be perpendicular will depend on whether the camera was tilted up or down when the shot was taken. I would say it is not obviously so, although John's version looks good too. Yes, there is little highlight detail, but it also looks as though there is nothing you can do about that. As to color matching, it depends on whether you want it to match the original or whether you want it to match the color when it was taken. I suspect the scanning service did the former.</p>

[david_henderson]

<p>I think the tilting is trivial. But anyway its extremely easy to fix. </p>

<p>The colours and contrast are a different issue. I imagine there might not have been a lot of room for manoeuvre on the scans- and it may well be that the original print had a similar character. But its amazing to me that so many people seems to stress about the colours they get in scanning when its often pretty easy to improve that in editing. The thing about scanning is to make sure you capture all the detail from lights to darks. I actually don't imagine that a rescan of a polaroid print is going to be that much better than you've got. </p>

<p>I got to the point below in a couple of minutes in Photoshop as a break from preparing my last year accounts- today's must do job. Its not brilliant, I don't claim massive expertise in Photoshop- but I did get a bit more detail in the light areas and corrected the colour casts a bit . Tried not to make it too saturated, and don't know how much better a PS king might have got it because I suspect the original print isn't great now. I've got more of an issue with the blacks than the highlights. </p><div></div>

[erwin_schaefer]

<p><br /><br />The trees and the flagpole can be verified parallel in PS which proves that the image is crooked. If the Polaroid was taken crooked (a very common occurrence) and the scan was aligned with edge of the image there is no problem that PS cannot resolve in a minute.<br /><br /></p>