photo to colour

[wendilla]

My friend has a black and white photo of him working on a tractor that was taken in 1956. He bought the picture recently from the newspaper. It was just taken by ordinary photographers camera. How could he get this photo in colour .Only solution we can come up with is to get an artist to do it. Any other suggestions would be grateful .

[ChuckFickens]

You've basically got it.

For want of a better way of putting it, you need to colour it in and to do a good job will require somebody with the appropriate level of talent.

[wendilla]

Thanks chuck I knew I would get a good answer from you.

[jno]

if the original is black and white you'd have to do it artificially, and guess what colour his shirt (etc) was. You could try an artist, or scan it in and use a Photoshop-type programme to do it yourself

http://pixlr.com/editor/

(there are others available free online too).

[wendilla]

Yes that would not be a problem as it was taken in a field and he was driving the tractor and knows the colours on that .

[woofgang]

you can have a go yourself with a digital program and a scanned copy. Photoshop elements and paintshop pro both offer 30 day free trials, google corel and adobe for the links.
Tutorial here for gimp.
http://emptyeasel.com...e-photograph-in-gimp/
Gimp is free download here
http://www.gimp.org/

[woofgang]

good morning jno!

[ChuckFickens]

Though you do have to remember that having the correct tool for a job doesn't automatically give a person the talent to do it well.

Shading and tinting a photo so it looks realistic is a very involved and tricky job (making it so it looks like a 5year old has coloured it in is easy, but I doubt that's the desired effect)

[jno]

bonjour, woofy, working on your next pastoral landscape?

[jno]

^^^ what Chuck says. I'm not sure it requires "talent" as such, just skill, which can be acquired. But it takes a lot of patience.

[woofgang]

chuck doing it digitally is non destructive, you might find that the outcome is satisfactory and if it isn't you haven't lost anything except some time.
Cleaning today jno, visitors!

[wendilla]

wow that looks a bit complicated for my brain but will pass this info on to someone else that might understand it better. Thanks all for replies.

[MichaelZZ]

This link might give you some ideas:
http://www.ephotozine...g-video-tutorial-1297