How to clean Slides and/or Negatives

[Inspeqtor]

I have my fathers old slides most are in fair condition, but I found some he took at my brothers wedding in 1962 that have specks of dust (I hope that is what it is) that are really bad. Is there a safe easy way to clean slides or negatives of dust like this. I am not sure how difficult these slides would be to "fix in Elements" but I do think this would be pretty difficult for me to do in Elements.


Here are two of the worst ones I found.



Thank you for any help you can give me!

[Sepiana]

Feb 19, 2021 19:35:16 GMT Inspeqtor said:

I am not sure how difficult these slides would be to "fix in Elements" but I do think this would be pretty difficult for me to do in Elements.

Charles,

Elements can tackle this kind of cleaning-up. Give it a chance! I'm sure you can do it. 

By using the spot healing brush and filters, you can remove dust and specks from old photos in Photoshop Elements without taking out too much detail.

Source:  Remove Dust and Specks From a Scanned Image With Photoshop Elements

[pontiac1940]

Charles 
EDIT
TRY THIS ON DISPOSABLE TEST SLIDES FIRST. 
Slides have an "emulsion" side and it should be the back of the slide when the slide is viewed by holding up to the light so it is correct vs reversed. You can tell which is which by holding to the light at an angle. The emulsion side is finely textured and the other side is smooth. The emulsion-side texture actually "outlines" significant features in the actual image. (If this is not readily apparent then do a test on a trash slide.) You can clean the front (non emulsion) of the slide with 99% ethyl alcohol...and 99% iso. Not 70% hand sani!    Use a Q-tip. If the Q-tip leaves lint then use a hand blower to dust off the Q-tip lint. Slides are tougher than you'd think! 
The emulsion side might smear. Try both sides on a couple of slides that are not important. 
So this only works on one side, but potentially can clean half of the dust. A hand blower might removed some of the dust on the emulsion side.
After this you will have to use PSE as Sepiana suggested. 
Be careful. 
Clive 
PS: I just cleaned an old slide with 99% ISO and it was a charm on the front and actually only smeared the emulsion if I pressed hard. Worth trying in junk slides. 

[Inspeqtor]

Sepiana,

From your link:

One of the quickest ways to reduce the amount of correction work required for any image is a simple crop. Before you begin, crop your image so that the focal point is close to one of the imaginary rule of thirds intersections.



Once your image is cropped, you can clean it up using Elements:

I am not understanding the cropping they are telling me here to do.  Using the rule of thirds, do I somehow crop the image into 3 separate images fix each image by itself then merge the images back into one image when all is done?

You telling me it is not that hard was helpful.  When doing things like this I always prefer videos so I did a youtube search for "Using Photoshop Elements to remove dust and specks" and I found:


www.youtube.com/watch?v=4GicXy9aFVM

I am going to give this a try.  Let you know later......

Thank you!

[Inspeqtor]

Clive,

I have 91% Isopropyl Alcohol, not 99% 

I am going to try working from the video I found first

[Sepiana]

Feb 19, 2021 21:08:24 GMT Inspeqtor said:

Sepiana,

From your link:

One of the quickest ways to reduce the amount of correction work required for any image is a simple crop. Before you begin, crop your image so that the focal point is close to one of the imaginary rule of thirds intersections.

Once your image is cropped, you can clean it up using Elements:

I am not understanding the cropping they are telling me here to do.  Using the rule of thirds, do I somehow crop the image into 3 separate images fix each image by itself then merge the images back into one image when all is done?

Charles,

If you click on "rule of thirds", you will be taken to the page below. Scroll down to . . . Rule 04 Get Comfortable with the Rule of Thirds. It will explain what they are talking about.

www.lifewire.com/essential-rules-for-photography-composition-4691044

When you use the Crop tool in Elements, one of the Overlay options is Rule of Thirds.

[Inspeqtor]

Sepiana,

I just watched the video I left the link on.  That is very intense. so may steps to follow.  Plus if I follow George's steps I would have to figure out where to separate my many different pictures which are totally different from the photo he used in the tutorial.

Where do I find Rule of Thirds inside Elements to click on?

[Sepiana]

Feb 19, 2021 22:26:23 GMT Inspeqtor said:

Where do I find Rule of Thirds inside Elements to click on?

It's a Grid Overlay in the Tool Options of the Crop tool. When you select it, Elements will create a grid guide on your image according to the Rule of Thirds. 

[Inspeqtor]

Sepiana,

Thank you.  Now that I have found the rule of thirds, on the link you gave to me,  I did do the rule of thirds on the photo of my brother and his bride it looks like this:



When Sue Chastain said to crop the photo using the rule of thirds, did she mean to crop it as a whole picture in the outline of the outside edges?

Did you have a chance to peek at the video from the link I put in this thread?  Are you familiar with George Peirson as an Elements Guru?

In the video George split his photo into 2 horizontal lines (3 sections) to clean dust from that photo.  It did not take him too long, but he is an expert, I am far from an expert.  I typically only dabble in Elements for easy fixes.

[Sepiana]

Feb 20, 2021 4:07:56 GMT Inspeqtor said:

When Sue Chastain said to crop the photo using the rule of thirds, did she mean to crop it as a whole picture in the outline of the outside edges?

Here is what she said . . .

"Before you begin, crop your image so that the focal point is close to one of the imaginary rule of thirds intersections."

When you activate the Rule of Thirds Grid Overlay, you use it as a guide to position objects before cropping your image. Sometimes, cropping will follow the edges of the image; other times, you will have to move the grid around before cropping. In short, it varies from one image to another.

Feb 20, 2021 4:07:56 GMT Inspeqtor said:

In the video George split his photo into 2 horizontal lines (3 sections) to clean dust from that photo.

What he is doing is tackling the dust specks in a selective way.

He makes a selection of the area to be cleaned, invokes Refine Edge to fine-tune the selection edges, and outputs the result as a New Layer with a Layer Mask. That's what you see in his layer stack -- selections, each on its own layer with a mask.

[Inspeqtor]

Feb 20, 2021 4:48:06 GMT Sepiana said:

"Before you begin, crop your image so that the focal point is close to one of the imaginary rule of thirds intersections."

When you activate the Rule of Thirds Grid Overlay, you use it as a guide to position objects before cropping your image. Sometimes, cropping will follow the edges of the image; other times, you will have to move the grid around before cropping. In short, it varies from one image to another.

Do you know if there is anything, written or a video that would explain all if the above in more detail?

[Sepiana]

Charles, see if this will help.

Rule of Thirds

Crop to the Rule of Thirds in Photoshop Elements

[Inspeqtor]

Thank you Sepiana!

[Sepiana]

Charles, you are most welcome! Post back if you have more questions.

[Chris]

Inspeqtor, You can probably remove all the dust in PS elements. However, if you feel the dust is too great then:

1- First try a blower brush. There are some camel hair anti static lens brushes that might do the trick. You can also buy an inexpensive "rocket" blower brush from a camera store that is quite powerful. I always use a rocket blower or a blower brush before scanning.
2- Sometimes you can remove more stubborn dust with a dry soft tissue without pressing too hard.
3- As a final resort use a dry soft tissue and pure isopropyl alcohol from a pharmacy without anything added (don't use rubbing alcohol which contains oil) . Don't press too hard. The emulsion side is very fragile when it is wet from water. That's why isopropyl alcohol is safer to use because it acts as a drying agent.

By the way here is a tutorial about the rule of thirds and the golden spiral. Of course every picture is different and sometimes having the subject in the middle still works fine.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=awBbvXyNbQI

Kind regards
Chris

PS. if you have a lot of negatives with this problem, you could also check out the free Polaroid dust and scratch filter. Its a little known programme and works very well to automatically remove pure white or pure black dust spots from scanned images. It can be installed as a stand alone programme on Windows 10 in compatibility mode. There is also a 32 bit plug in for a Mac. 

www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3836494

www.kenrockwell.com/tech/photoshop/polaroid-dust-filter.htm