THE CALL OF THE GREAT OUTDOORS

First let me say I am sorry for being a bit distracted as of late. The best of ideas often become shipwrecked due to numerous obstacles. The labor of rehabbing newly acquired pictures, working on my own projects plus a myriad of other distractions have allowed days to pass by until I wonder if the things I do daily will become vintage projects themselves.

I spent quite a bit of time researching old cameras since our last visit and found one of my best resources to be, of all places, e-bay, since most reputable dealers of older cameras spend a bit of time describing their wares. My hopes of buying a few cameras to replicate their unique characteristics were soon forgotten when I started biding on a few used “folders.” Let me say there are a lot of people still collecting cameras from the 1920 through 1940 era.

One dealer I spent time talking to warned about buying cameras that were on e-bay which were listed as good condition because the bellows, no matter how they look, often leak and it doesn't take much light to ruin a photograph. Though the shutter works, most are no longer clicking at the speeds marked on the lens. A reputable dealer cleans the works, sets the timing and replaces the bellows if necessary.

Perhaps after the new computer finds its way to my desk, then I will buy a Kodak or Afga folder (a bellowed camera that closes up into a case). There was a time when several of the older cameras could be found about the house, bet, alas, they have disappeared.

But on with the pictures. I have an 81 year old friend who I see a couple of times a week. He has recently discovered the stories from Shelly's Cafe and I swap stories for pictures. Truthfully he loves black and whites and since he knows my passion for the same he has started to donate pictures to the cause. As time goes on I will shuffle his photos in with my own collection.

remember- you can click on the photos to enlarge them!

What could be more heartwarming than a boy and his dog. It would be my guess that this picture was taken by a newer vintage Kodak style camera because of the sharpness of detail. The only thing I had to do to finish the photograph after I digitally enhanced it was take away the noise (white spotting ) and remove the shadow off the face. The hardest task I encounter is cleaning the five o'clock shadow of the face which can often make a ten year old look like a felon. You will also notice that many old cameras had a very large depth of field--in other words the background is as clear as the main focus which in this case is boy and dog. The best I could gather on the history of this photo is it likely came from West Virginia.

Another interesting photo given to me by my friend Jack. Okay, let me be truthful, this picture brings out the softy in me. When I first seen the enlarged picture, the shoes told the story of a family who had very little money. The britches are thread bare, but they did have a clean white shirts though a bit to big. Perhaps the photographer had a supply of clean shirts for the folks who had their pictures taken--don't be surprised The picture was taken during hard times still the parents found enough money to have their two sons sit for a photo.

My heart ached and I wished I could go back and at least buy new shoes for the lads. Funny thing--there doesn't seem to be any look of poverty in their face. Could it be the boys didn't know they were poor. Perhaps other kids around them were deeper in despair than this family. Nonetheless this picture has a thousand words encased between the lines.





Above is the tale of two photographs. The two are similar in the thought since we are looking at early photos of the "family" car, at least in the way America first looked at the courageous concept of heading out on the open road, ruts and all. The top photo I would guess was taken with an early box style camera. Remember, a lot of editing and cropping went into that fuzzy picture to salvage what you see here, while the bottom photograph was taken with a folder like the one seen in the hands of the girl on the right. The newer cameras were night and day from the box camera but still only gave the customer a small 2x3 photo for the owners to gaze upon--but how exciting for the family to share.

There was a lot of shadows to erase on the bottom of the family car photo in order to get a good look, otherwise their feet and the shadows were one. The first picture of the family looked a bit over-edited (below) so I re-worked the photo again. The original photo was a very small scratched and faded photograph. A lot of work went into this photo but it brought the shot back to life. This was several days work since I had to wipe the slate clean several times and start over. But alas, I will call it finished

To finish today's blog I want to share a really old picture from my adopted grandmother's family. It was a hunting camp, likely around Big Bear Lake, California in the San Gabriel Mountains. I remember her talking about their hunting grounds but I can't put a finger on the exact location. Anyway, I saw this Chevy in other pictures. It seems like they were gutting out the vehicle for whatever reason. You use your imagination on this shot--one of my favorites.



Hope to return soon. I have a pile of really neat school pictures to post next time around. Until then, smile and say cheese

CARS, KIDS, DOGS AND CATS

Old cars always have a certain photograph personality. Rarely do we see a picture of a car without a proud owner beaming a smile, or as we see below the car, in days of old was transformed into camping vehicles with all things possible tied down to hoods, running boards, trunks or assorted other body panels.

I tried to nail down the brand of car shown above by asking my elderly car nuts whom I see on a regular basis. Looking at the two by three picture they could not put a tag on it, but one gentleman who is a major collector said he thought it might be a REO. The lower self made camping-fishing mobile was a Chevrolet.

The husband wife team I know. In later years I was her private nurse so the book of over a hundred black and whites was given to me after her death of a healthy 91. Her husband I never met but he was by all accounts a very bright man who was both a Chiropractor and an MD in Los Angeles. Likely the couple had visited Big Bear Lake for a fishing weekend. The cutesy gal on the running board, eh, not likely.

Back to the upper picture. This photo is very old. I spent many hours trying to rehab it and considering it was a small photo with extreme fading I was surprised at the results. Was that my friend inside? Can't say. A small cat suddenly appeared on the bottom which was not visible by the naked eye.




Children young and old were and still are snapshot favorites. Of course, when the two pictures were taken the camera was far different than today's film or digital camera. A small 2 1/2 by 3 1/2 picture was placed in the album and likely looked at for several generations. We loved them, fuzzy dark and all. Of course with the Brownie, we had to be outside staring at the bright sun for the optimal snapshot since there was no flash bulbs and just one setting for the lens. Later cameras came with bellows and flash attachments. More on the history of cameras in blogs to come.

The girl above taught me a great lesson. She needed a lot of work to clean up her cute face. There was a lot of shadow to remove as well as a ton of "noise". After working on it for about three hours the computer shut down on me and I lost all the work. Photo Shop does not automatically save your work! You must start out with a file name and save, save, save. There is also a way to empty your cache after performing every task you perform. When that fills up, then bang, you run out of memory and in my case, all the work was lost. Ahh, live and learn. The sad part--I knew about the memory cache and failed to put into action my newly acquired knowledge.

The scanner does a lot of the work, but when you enlarge the shot, and fine tune the photograph, the more work it creates. Both of the shots are circa 1920's and would the owners be amazed at what snapshot lovers could do 80 years down the road.

I love both photographs. The innocence of the young girl, all dressed up in her winter coat and hat compared to the ingenuity of the young lad with his Little Rascal set up. Boys had to use their imagination back then, as well as what ever stuff they could find laying around to create the dream machines. In the above photo notice the spoon and pump pail. Both objects were not visible in the photo. The spoon, just a light background object, looks huge. That was the prospective you got with the small lens. The pail sat in a dark shadow and needed a lot of work to bring it back to life. I could have ignored it, but that is part of the restoration.

The face of the girl was also shadowed so I had to enlarge it about 200 percent and start eliminating the shadow, spot by spot, hundreds of them. Suddenly she had eyes and a cute nose. You really have to love black and whites to do all the work. So this is my photograph album for the world to see.

I have numerous more photos to scan and clean up. I have run into memory problems so I am downloading hundreds of photos onto thumb drives. I am pricing external hard drives to use until I cash out on the new computer. Patience is a virtual I am learning but the account is growing.

Be sure to hit on the photos to enlarge them

Caution Work In Progress

Another work in progress? Well it seems that way and I guess it is about time to run a prototype post and explain what is going on here. As some of you may know I run another blog for stories, some newer photos and a bit of political jabbing from time to time. Good or bad, you won't find any of that here.

What this site is trying to accomplish is a journal of restored black and white photos, some destined for the trash barrel, others rescued from garage sales and hopefully a few donated. Aside from my new business of photo restoration, which is yet to start, this will be a page where personal work can be displayed along with some interesting facts of early Kodak style photography.


I'm not happy with the layout yet, but another reminder, this is a work in progress. I want to be able to do more with this site, but not complicate matters beyond my ability. Also, friends who have links with my other site may find they are not here. No snuffing intended. This is a place where both my liberal and conservative friends can stop by without feeling they are being tugged one way or other. Instead, the links will be for those relating towards photography.

So feel free to browse as time goes on. If you are new to my site please note I am trying to upgrade my computer and equipment. I just purchased the Epson 750 Pro scanner and a new, larger computer is needed. E-bay took me part of the way to my dreams but the cost of doing business there is too high, so if you are a lover of black and white and the history it brings back to life please consider hitting that little PayPay button.

Thanks
Shelly


Remember to click on photos
Before

This photo of our daring young gals in the 1920's era shows both a before and after scan. Note the pack of cigarettes in the hands of the gal in the middle. It is amazing what a little time and Photoshop can do.

The photo was originally 4 x 2 1/2 inches with little detail visible. Just imagine how amazed the original camera user would have been to see this photo

I will try and keep the photos as original as possible as the blog progresses, with any major changes noted. There is more that can be accomplished with this picture, but this is a test run for my new blog.


After