Saturday, May 23, 2009

Extra: Slide Restoration Demo

These 1970s era Kodachrome slides were, for the most part, in remarkably good condition. However, many of the slides needed some rather serious restoration work.

I cleaned the "problem slides" using a solution made by PEC-12. Takes out smudges and fingerprints without leaving any residue. Some of the slides had to be removed from their original cardboard/plastic mounts and remounted. I like to use Wess full-frame slide mounts for this.

The slides were scanned with a Nikon Coolscan 5000 film scanner, then "sleeved" in archival quality slide sheets. No PVCs (polyvinyl chlorides) allowed! PVCs will damage film emulsion over time, so slide sheets must be "PVC free". Clear File's ArchivalPlus slide sheets are good.

Next step was to open the scanned images in Photoshop and go to town on them. Most of the scratches and other imperfections were removed. The film scanner software can help with this process, too. Colors have been corrected and restored to their original Brady Bunch-era glory whenever possible.

This is Fred McKellar and his awesome catch before and after the restoration. Click on this image to open it up for a better look.

Wish I had more slides to share, but I hope you've enjoyed these!

2 comments:

  1. You are a wizard! Thanks for posting these.

    ReplyDelete