Making copies of a photo - no negative

phog

I have an old colour photograph of my mother and uncle, how would I go about getting copies of it, I dont have the negative.

Thanks in advance.

AnCatDubh

On the assumption that the photograph isn't copyrighted (is in the family, taken by the family, assumed permission to reproduce), then any foto lab worth their salt will be able to do it for you. They will usually charge a couple of euro for the scanning of it in and the cost of a print to whatever size that you need.

But, be sure you are clear on the copyright side of things. Whomever held the camera and pressed the shutter release legally owns the rights to reproduce the image.

Hope that helps.

smelltheglove

I had a photo place for a bit which I rented from someone ,whenever restoring photos she used to just take a photo of the photo, I tried it myself a few times and results werent bad.

Thoie

I worked one summer in a place that had a special setup for this kind of thing (restoring old B&W photos, often torn, creased). We'd take a photo of the photo, then touch it up by hand during development.

A friend recently asked me about it (found an old photo from 18something), and my first thought these days was just to scan it, and touch it up digitally. Am I missing something with that thought?

AnCatDubh

Thoie wrote: »

my first thought these days was just to scan it, and touch it up digitally. Am I missing something with that thought?

Nope, I think that's what all the labs are doing at the moment but I do like smellthegloves idea of taking a photo of the photo - must try that one myself.

I've done it with the scanner setup and it can yield some quite good results.

smelltheglove

Steve aka stcstsc was a great help to me during my time at this location, initially I though scan, I have a scanner and was intending to bring it to the location although Steve mentioned if the scanner scans in low quality then you will get better quality from a photo, although my scanner had an option to scan at high quality it could take 30 mns and sometimes it would freeze the computer. As above I would take a photo and then do any touch ups required, often with old old photos that had been of deceased family members etc.

hmboards

I've scanned lots of old photos in, but the amount of dust that shows up in the scanned images is unreal. And that's after brushing them down with a lens airbrush etc. first. It puts me off using the scanner. I don't think the problem is as severe if copying by taking a photo of the original as the light source isn't as close to the dust.

AnCatDubh

hmboards wrote: »

I've scanned lots of old photos in, but the amount of dust that shows up in the scanned images is unreal. And that's after brushing them down with a lens airbrush etc. first. It puts me off using the scanner. I don't think the problem is as severe if copying by taking a photo of the original as the light source isn't as close to the dust.

I found this too on a few that I had done, but what i thought was 'dust' never appeared when I printed it out - perhaps it was too minute to make a difference. It was annoying to see though. I also wondered if I was scanning at too high a resolution. Meh, as it didn't effect the output and I was doing a simple copy, I didn't worry too much in my case.

phog

smelltheglove wrote: »

I had a photo place for a bit which I rented from someone ,whenever restoring photos she used to just take a photo of the photo, I tried it myself a few times and results werent bad.

Might try photographing the photo.

Thanks