PhotoWise Calgary

Tag: photo deterioration

  • Preserving Your Family Legacy With Photo Restoration

    Preserving Your Family Legacy With Photo Restoration

    First off, I would like to wish each and every one of you a very Happy New Year!

    Here’s hoping that you greatly enjoyed the holidays and were able to take lots of photos with your family members and friends. They will certainly make for many great memories!

    Preserving Your Family Legacy

    You are very likely looking forward to making new memories in the months to come.  With today’s smartphones doubling as digital cameras, those memories will be easier to hold on to than ever before. However…

    Do you find your memories of years past beginning to fade?

    Of course you do. It’s only natural. However, if I substituted the word “memories” with “photographs” in that question, it would likely provide the same answer. Both our memories and old photographs tend to fade over time. We can only remember so many vivid details. When it comes to old photographs, they can’t help but endure a mix of erosion, wear and tear and fading from age or poor storage. This is why I so highly recommend Photo Restoration.

    At PhotoWise, we offer custom digital photo restoration, retouching and enhancement to give new life to your old photos! We use a state-of-the-art scanning process that makes digital copies of your old and tattered photographs, saving them in very high resolutions. We then manually restore each photo using professional software.

    To tell you the truth, this requires a very skillful touch. It takes both precision and time to adequately restore an old photo, especially if it is in really bad shape. This process, by the way, presents no risks to your original photos. They will not be damaged any further than they already are. We care for your photos like they were our own.

    What are the major benefits of photo restoration?

    They undo seemingly permanent damage.  Old photos generally take quite the beatings. They get folded and bent. They get scratched and ripped. They get torn and sliced. Some even get burnt! Our Photo Restoration process helps to do away with those “blemishes” to bring old pictures back to states that appear as if they were recently taken. It’s quite the remarkable outcome. I truly enjoy the reactions I get when my customers see their old once-thought-to-be-unsalvageable pictures look brand new again.

    They help to preserve your family history.

    If you ask me, this is the biggest deal. The act of restoring photos is a lot more than saving old pictures. It keeps your family legacy alive. Most people believe that their family photos are their most prized possessions and list them as the number one thing they’d most want to save if their houses were burning down.

    Keep in mind that your restored photos are also saved digitally. Once your photos are restored, you can make as many copies of them as you wish. Digitally restored photos make incredible gifts for family members and friends.

    I believe that yesterday’s memories preserved with today’s technology provide tomorrow’s treasures. Please don’t hesitate to contact me today to learn more about the Photo Restoration services offered by PhotoWise!

  • How to Protect Your Photos from Loss, Theft or Damage

    How to Protect Your Photos from Loss, Theft or Damage

    Protecting Printed Photos From Loss, Theft Or Damage

    First and foremost, I’d like to send my warmest wishes for a speedy return to safety and comfort for everyone who has been affected by the recent hurricanes and earthquakes. I can only imagine how terrifying it must have been to have to hunker down and ride out severe storms that took lives and destroyed homes.

    I’m proud that Canada is stepping up to aid in the relief efforts. You can do your part to help by donating to the Canadian Red Cross online. It’s hard to tell, of course, how long it will take for normalcy to be restored, but I do know that the more we help, the easier the transition will be.

    The importance of saving your memories.

    Keeping safe during a natural disaster is always of paramount importance. However, I can’t help but think about how many memories storms like Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma have robbed from people. Naturally, in the midst of the many possessions we keep in our homes are our photos.  Photos, of course, capture moments in our lives that are meant to be cherished forever.  Our memories can only hold on to so much information without photos to help us recall those special times.

    Recent events serve as a reminder to digitize your photos in case of an unforeseen event that could destroy them forever. Once your photos are scanned, they can be both saved and backed up as digital files as well as reprinted. Essentially, scanning your old photos gives them renewed and longer lives – and helps protect them against being lost forever in the event of loss, theft or damage.photo albums to be scanned

    PhotoWise can help you protect your photos.

    Here at the PhotoWise studio we offer top-of-the-line photo scanning services.  Our equipment includes a variety of professional high-resolution and high-speed scanning machines and custom software applications. Each photo is checked for quality and scanned by hand. We want you to enjoy your photos for generations to come!

    Turn your old photos into canvas prints, put them in published photo books or print enlargements as gifts for your family members and friends. You have many options!

    Of course, a natural disaster isn’t particularly necessary in order for your old photos to be destroyed. In many cases, pictures that have been tucked away in shoeboxes or sticky albums for years deteriorate due to acidic environments, dust, mould and even insect infestations.  Don’t allow your precious memories to fade due to the passing of time and/or unforeseen circumstances…

    Please don’t hesitate to contact me today to find out how we can help organize, digitize and restore your family photos to bring new life to them and preserve your precious memories forever!

  • How To Give New Life To Old Photographs

    How To Give New Life To Old Photographs

    How To Provide New Life To Old Memories

    Now that September is here, our children are about to embark on a new school year where more memories will be made. There’s a special feeling that comes with the first day of school each year – for both children and their parents. Parents can’t help but pull out the camera to capture those infectious smiles (and sometimes frowns) that appear on the faces of their children during this time of year.

    I gleefully imagine that, one day, they’ll be able to look back on the photos and share stories with their kids about the memories they made while in school. Of course, in the future, it will be a lot simpler for my kids to be able to preserve and share their photos than it was for me – because just about every picture taken these days is saved and backed up digitally. If you’re like me and you have a ton of old printed photos, know that there’s no better way to ensure their preservation than to have them digitized!

    Digitizing your photos protects them from being lost forever!

    Old Photos To Be Restored in Calgary

    Not only is it a good idea to scan your old photos so that they can be shared online (emailing them to family members who live abroad is a whole lot easier, faster, and cheaper than shipping a stack of photos in the mail), but photo scanning also helps to preserve memories that would otherwise deteriorate.

    Here’s hoping you never have to encounter a mishap that destroys your photos forever…

    “We never think it’s going to happen to us until – well – it happens to us,” comments Curtis Bisel on ScanYourEntireLife.com, “We build our homes with wood and run pipes in and around them so it only seems reasonable to expect a few of them here and there might catch on fire or get really wet. Your insurance might replace a lot of possessions, but it’s not going to bring back those albums full of paper prints.”

    Digitization can breathe new life into your old and damaged photos!

    Our dear ancestors deserve more than to have their precious photographs kept in storage – fading away all crumpled and torn. Luckily, modern technology has blessed us with a little something called digital photo restoration. It makes your old photos new again, our clients often say it’s ‘like magic’.

    “As soon as you digitize your vintage pictures, deterioration is arrested,” explains Frank Arnoth on SaveFamilyPhotos.com, “Perhaps more importantly, the digitized images can, in many cases, be brought back to their original glory with relative ease, if the changes have not been too great.”

    Before and After of Digital Photo Restoration Calgary
    Our Photo Restoration Service; Before and After
    Did you know that both Photo Scanning and Photo Restoration are specialties at PhotoWise?

    The before and after photo above is from my personal collection of ancestry photos. This precious little photo is only 2 inches big, cut on various angles, and was also folded, scratched and stained.  It was carried around this way for many years and traveled half way around the world before it reached it’s current home in my cherished collection.  I was determined to repair it and share it with my extended family – both as a digital image and published in my family heritage photo books.  Mission Accomplished!

    At PhotoWise we use a variety of professional high-resolution scanning machines and custom software applications to preserve and restore your precious photos.  Each photo is scanned by hand, checked for quality, and includes straightening, cropping, and basic image enhancement.  If your photo is damaged and needs more repair we will scan it and digitally restore it without affecting the original print.

    Please don’t hesitate to contact me today to find out how we can help organize, digitize and restore your family photos to bring new life to them and preserve your precious memories forever!

  • Photo Deterioration: What Can Be Done?

    Photo Deterioration: What Can Be Done?

    Protecting Your Precious Photos From Deteriorating

    Sunlight. It can be a photographer’s best friend and a photograph’s worst enemy. Sensibly, photographers like having their subjects well-lit and natural sunlight helps to make for bright and beautiful pictures. However, no photographer would ever like to have his or her developed photos spend time in the sun. The same sunshine that helped to provide the perfect lighting for photos is often a culprit in the dulling and deterioration of their prints.

    How do photos deteriorate over time?

    Sunlight is far from the only enemy of your precious photographs. Photo prints, as well as negatives, are created with the use of chemical dyes that are sensitive to light, humidity and changes in temperature. The chemicals used to create the images are subject to fading, turning yellow and even cracking when the photos are placed in direct sunlight. (side note: This is why we recommend only framing copies of photos – not the originals – to hang on your household walls!)

    Dust, dirt, even natural oil residue from our fingers when handling our prized photo collections can contribute to their deterioration. Therefore, it’s important to consider the ways in which we store our photos. We often use shoeboxes, bins and non-photosafe albums to house our pictures and then store them away in the downstairs closet, garage, basement or other out-of-sight locations.  We assume that these photos are stored away safely, but the truth is that our homes don’t always provide safe havens for old photos.

    Now that the summer is here, high humidity levels can wreak havoc on photos that are piled on top of each other in your hidden shoeboxes or inside “magnetic” sticky albums. The added moisture in the air causes the prints to stick together or to the album pages and the damage can be extensive if the quality of air in the home is also poor.  Also, if any little critters are creeping around your basement and getting into the storage spaces containing your photos, you might find pictures that have deteriorated at excelled rates! (The adhesive in those old albums is delicious to some bugs and rodents.)

    What can be done to protect your one-of-a-kind photos from deteriorating over time?

    One simple option is to utilize the wonderful technology of photo digitization. By digitizing your cherished photos, you have the added benefit of being able to digitally restore them! Scanned photos offer security through safe multi-location back up and assures them of long-lasting lives.

    What are the top reasons to have your photographs digitized?

    In addition to protecting your cherished memories from becoming faded scraps of paper, digitizing your photos is a great way to preserve memories in the event that you lose your original prints. We don’t often think about the possibilities of fire, flood or divorce but these are just a few of the circumstances that can cause families to lose their one-of-a-kind photos. Digitally restoring your old photo album pictures will ensure that they are protected from fading and other damage before it’s too late!

    photo deterioration caused by stack of thick photo albumsAs well, those old “magnetic” photo albums that require you to stick photos on adhesive-laden pages don’t protect the images – they destroy them. Will you allow me to give you just one piece of advice today that will instantly make your photos safer?  Remove your photos from those sticky albums immediately. If you find they are really stuck and begin to tear when you attempt to remove them – contact me for help!

    PhotoWise offers Photo & Document Scanning to help you organize, preserve and enjoy your cherished photo collection. We happily give families the peace of mind in knowing that their fondest memories will be preserved forever and ready to share with the next generation. Contact us to find out how we can protect your precious photos from deteriorating today!