General Chat

Some time ago I noticed that photos I'd taken in the 1970s had started to change colour to a rather pinkish shade. They are kept safely in good albums but it appears to be the films. Some have changed more than others. Somewhere I've still got most of the negatives so I'm not too worried but it is disappointing.

I've been asked to give a talk in November about my childhood visits to Russia in the 1960s (my Dad worked in the British Embassy in Moscow) and I took out all his slides from the cupboard where they have been for some years. I gave a similar talk to a ladies' group about 20 years ago when the slides were fine but now they too are turning pink and fading!

My husband and I have spent the past couple of days sorting slides and scanning them in, then sharpening the images and rebalancing the colours. So far we've only done a fraction of them.

I notice that black and white photos taken at the same time are still lovely and crisp.

I then had the thought.......as family historians we treasure all the Victorian photos we've inherited, but will the colour pictures we took before digital cameras still be around for our descendants?

I've got to try to save as many as I can onto discs as soon as I can, before my childhood and early adulthood fade away.

Sue
x

Best way to save photos is black and white or sepia.

Colour photos lose colour after about 20-30 years. I've heard it said that one day all our photos we have framed on the wall will one day disappear (unless hand coloured).

I've been told by a friend who works on computers for a living and knows his way round them that even on a computer disk they will eventually fade away!

The film that was used - both in cameras and the 'big screen' was new, innovative - and rubbish!!
Even the films from the cinema of the 1970's have to be touched up!!

maggie

So what's the answer is photos fade and disks do too (how long?)

It seems so sad.

I was looking at slides yesterday which I remember being bright and beautiful last time I looked and now they are pale by comparison.

It's been fun using the Internet to look up some places from my photos though. I was looking in case some pictures were too faded to use and perhaps there were images of the same places online.

Comparing some places from 40 years ago and how they are now has been fascinating. I even found a 9 minute video on Youtube showing a car journey through Moscow and the last few seconds were showing the street where I lived.

I was able to use the Snippy programme (a search on google will find that) to copy images from the video and compare the street with how it was.

Sue

Well I guess that explains why the pics I was so proud of from my teens are looking really fuzzy/faded. Guess I better get them all scanned now before they deteriorate further.

Yes Summer.

Fortunately using a photo processing thingy like Photoshop means we can do a colour balance. It means my pics now have blue skies instead of pink ones and the whole pic is a bit washed out but at least I have them saved as digital versions.

Sue
x

There was one year, I think in the 70s when some colour films went a horrid red-orange colour.
The colour slides my b-i-l took at my wedding still look ok. I even had a couple of prints made 2 or 3 years ago. Must get them all put on as many different media as possible. Along with the thousands of other photos OH and I have taken over the years, and the b&w my parents and grandparents took.
So much to do, when will I ever find the time?
Huia.

Better start checking some of my pics, the colour ones o.h. scanned yesterday of my late cousin's family were still fairly ok but I have hundreds of photos stored all over the place in albums and packets and I bet some of those will have deteriorated. Would be sad if they faded too much to enjoy looking at, pics from my youth and so on.
Lizx
thanks for letting us know about this.

I put all my photos in proper scrap booking albums as they are acid and lignum (sp) free and that is what causes the photos to discolour in normal photo albums.
If you decide to dress up the pages you must use bits that are also acid and lignum free.
Not much use for older photos that have started to discolour but might save your newer ones :)

xx Jill

I think that film quality in the 1960s and 1970s is responsible for much of the problem. I have certain sets of photos which have changed colour more than others so I think the original film was to blame.

This explains why
http://www.deadmedia.org/notes/36/362.html

http://articles.directorym.com/Fixing_Discolored_Photos_with_Software-a937944.html

http://www.photoanswers.co.uk/Community-Landing/Forum-Landing/Forum-Categories/Topic/?&topic-id=89489

http://www.callofthewildphoto.com/articles/restore-colour-photos-digital-fix.html

Oh dear!
So my main project for the winter months will be to rescue my past I think......or as much as I can.

Sue
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I have been scanning old colour photos from the 70s. The ones on Kodak paper were ok but the ones on Agfa paper were a red/orange colour. However I found I could do a 'colour restore' which improved the colour enormously. I havent looked at the negs to see if they have changed colour. If not I will get my son to scan them sometime since I cant scan negs on my scanner. Well I can but cant turn them into a positive!
Huia.