Photo Friday - Step by Step to my Photo Repair

Original Photo

Repaired and Cropped Photo

Often when I post photos that I've repaired I get asked what software I use and how I did it, so I finally decided to do a post showing what I did.  This was a relatively basic repair so I figured it was a good place to start.  I'm sure that there are people out there with much more experience than I have in photo repair.  I'm self-taught and the tricks I've learned have suited me well so far.

Not every step is covered, but the most important parts are.  You'll have to play with your software's opacity levels and the various sizes of brushes to use with the cloning tool, but I imagine that most programs are relatively similar.  For this photo repair I used Microsoft Office Picture Manager to adjust the contrast and then Serif Photo Plus X2 for the rest of the repair.  It was a cheap and well rated photo editing software that I purchased through Amazon.com.

I don't know who the people are in this photo (maybe my family can help me out here when they read this post), but I've been told that my aunt was the artist that drew on the photo!  It wasn't a difficult repair, but if you're new to using photo-editing software there may be one or two swear words that escape your mouth as you go through your learning curve (at least there was for me when I first started!)

I opened the photo in Microsoft Office Picture Manager and adjusted the contrast to 10 then to 20.  Adjusting the contrast usually works well in grayscale photos, but you'll want to increase the percentage of contrast slowly so if you go too far and don't like the results, you can bring it down a little.

Contrast increased to 10%

Contrast increased to 20%

You can notice the big change in the scribbles in the sky of the photo.  The contrast removed much of it, without removing detail from the rest of the photo.

You then should familiarize yourself as to what the controls for your software's cloning tool and zoom look like.  This is what the Serif's look like:

After selecting the cloning tool the brush and opacity box automatically appeared at the top of the screen

I then zoomed in on the area I wanted to work on first.  In this case it was the sky.  Since this is a black & white photo the sky came across as white so this was a fairly easy fix with the cloning tool (set at 100% opacity in this case and I used a fairly large brush).  For my software I moved the brush circle to an area I wanted to clone, held down the Shift key, and left-clicked my mouse (you won't notice anything when you do this).  Then I moved to the area I wanted to replace with what I just copied and left-clicked my mouse.

NOTE: When cloning it does not simply copy that small area you clicked on.  It anchors the cloning to that specific area in relation to the next place you click.  So as you move the clone brush down the area you are painting over, both areas move together.  This means that if you aren't careful you may copy something that doesn't match: 

The circle is where I am cloning to and the "+" is where I am copying from.

As you can see in the example above, I've accidentally copied part of the building as I tried to repair the sky.  It's an easy fix.  You just click the undo button.

Eventually (and relatively painlessly) the sky was fixed and I moved on to areas on the bride's dress and white spots on the groom's suit.

The sky fixed

When repairing the groom's suit I used 100% opacity.  It's fairly dark so I really didn't need to be concerned with blending.  For the bride's gown, I used an opacity between 60-70% depending on what looks best.  The undo command is your friend as you figure it out.  I also used a fairly small sized brush so I could work in the much smaller area.

Remember that you don't need to click and drag while cloning.  When doing small repairs just left-click a little at a time.  You may need to experiment as to which areas are the best to "copy" or "clone" from.  You want something that is close in color/texture to the area you are repairing.  The opacity tool allows for better blending.  When I repaired the bride's gown, had I selected an opacity of 100% it would have copied the area exactly and it would have looked awful.  Copying at 60% opacity allowed the crayon/pencil area to be repaired with the copied area but it only matched the color at 60% of the original so the change looked much nicer.  For my lack of communication skills, allow me to show the difference:

100% opacity

60% opacity

At 100% you can actually see a circle where I clicked to repair the area.  With 60% you can see the repair, but only because the flaw to the left and right remain.  In the finished product it is barely noticeable.  If I had repaired the entire area at 100% opacity the result would have been a completely discolored (and brighter) line.  The point of a repair isn't to change the essence of the picture, but to remove the flaws.

I finally completed all the repairs that I wanted and saved the image.  I then went back to Microsoft Office's Picture Manager and cropped the picture to remove the white at the right side of the picture.

After cropping

Before cropping

NOTE:  Always remember to save the project you are working on under a different name so that if you don't like the results you can start over with the original.  If you just save your work, the original will be gone and the undo button won't work after a "save".

Photo repair takes a little patience, but once you get the hang of it, I promise that it does get quicker!

Wordless Wednesday - What the Heck, Grandpa?

Edward Brown Sr (2nd from right in back)

I have no idea why my grandpa is dressed like this and wearing a miner's hat with these gentlemen.  We are descended from a long line of miners, but my grandfather was a teacher and vice-principal at Grebey Junior High School in Hazleton, PA.  Were they actually in a coal mine?  I don't know all the fraternal groups my grandfather was in, but most (I believe) were Catholic or education associated.  I could be wrong.

Any ideas?

UPDATE:
My mother just emailed me after I posted and told me it was a teacher in-service to either a coal mine or a meat packing plant.  The headlamps lead her to believe coal mine, but the white jackets made her think it could be meat packing.

Tombstone Tuesday - Theresa Boegel

St. Kilian Cemetery, Fond du Lac County, WI

Theresa Boegel was the daughter of William and Katherine Boegel nee Melzer.  She was born on October 8, 1888 and died July 4, 1949.  She was the youngest of eight known children and never married.  Her siblings included:

William Jr (married to Mary Zwaska)
Maria (unknown if ever married)
Katherine (Mrs. Joseph Bonlender)
John (married to Bertha Rosbeck and is my husband's great grandfather)
Peter Aloysius (married to Elise Marten)
Raymond (married to Catherine Schrauth)
Mary (Mrs. Gebhardt Strabel)

Since Theresa never married and has no children to pass on her legacy, I will remember you today and always in our family history. Second great aunt to my husband.  Third great aunt to my children.  Your memory lives on.

Amanuensis Monday - Filling in Rosbeck Information One Name at a Time

It was so difficult to get a post up this evening.  The weekend was long and not very relaxing, although the Packers won, so that made me happy!  My oldest and the hubby were out camping with the Cub Scouts and the youngest and I did lots of running around, but we had some great snuggle time last night, staying up late and watching movies.  Of course, I paid for it this morning and it was all I could do to cheer on the Packers.  My mind was just too tired.  I attempted to transcribe an obituary only to realize that I had actually posted it a few months ago!  I thought I was going to be turning in without getting anything posted when I got my second wind.

Transcribing the obituary on Herman Rosbeck wasn't earth-shattering in any way, but it did give me information that I was missing from my family tree.  I now had a date for his death, and his wife's....and their marriage.  So while the transcription didn't give me any spectacular "Ah-ha!" moment, it did give me useful information.  Information that I can post online and maybe find someone researching my Rosbecks.  Information that I apparently had, but just hadn't gone through to enter it into my tree.  So even when I don't have time because of PTAing, Cub Scouting, and the various things that happen in our daily lives, I do realize that just getting something up on my blog helps me do a little with something I love so much.  So until I can give more time, I will tackle it (in this instance each Rosbeck) one name at a time.

"Herman J. Rosbeck

Herman J. Rosbeck, 81, Knowles, died Tuesday at Clearview Hospital, Juneau, where he was a patient for three months.

Mr. Rosbeck was an employee [sic] at Western Lime & Cement Co. in Nasboro for 30 years.  He was an active and long-time member of the Knowles Fire Department.

He was born on July 2, 1889, at St. Kilian to George and Margaret Rosbeck.  He married Sophia Schraufnagel on April 13, 1915, in Le Roy.

Survivors include one daughter, Mrs. Victor Schraufnagel, Route 1, Brownsville; one brother, Martin Rosbeck, West Bend; six grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.  He was preceded in death by his wife on June 23, 1969; three brothers, three sisters and one grandson.

Funeral services will be held at 9:30 a.m. Thursday at St. Andrew's Church, Le Roy, with the Rev. Anthony Gundrum as celebrant of the Mass.  Burial will be at St. Andrew's Cemetery.

Relative and friends may call after 3 p.m. today at Koepsell Funeral Home, Mayville."

Published in the Fond du Lac Commonwealth Reporter, Wednesday, 28APR1971, pg42

Sunday's Obituary - Remembering Nancy

A electronic scrapbook page Nancy created and linked to me.  This is her as a little girl.

It's been a year since something horrible happened.  I previously wrote about how my cousin, Nancy O'Donoghue nee Brown, still didn't have a tombstone at her grave.  Well, today marks the anniversary of her death.  I'll never forget how I found out about it either.


My Uncle Ed reads the hometown news online even though he now lives on Oahu.  He saw an obituary for Nancy and emailed my mother asking if this was one of the cousins I'd found doing my genealogy research.  My mom forwarded the link to me telling me how sorry she was.  I had just talked to Nancy by email less than a month earlier and seeing a news article about her murder was surreal.  I starred at the page on my computer and although I read it, I didn't really take it in.  It wasn't her.  Why were they sending this to me?  Then it finally sank in.  It was her.  My sweet, sweet cousin was gone.  Murdered by her husband.  That's not a shock you get over and I cried sporadically for several days whenever I thought about it.

I'm not saying that I was close with my cousin.  I'd met her once and communicated with her sporadically.  We both enjoyed genealogy research and we'd found each other researching the same line through an Ancestry.com message board.  Then Nancy suggested that we meet up the next time I came back to Pennsylvania.  I took her up on it.  We met at the Knotty Pines restaurant (a local, Hazleton, PA landmark that is now a parking lot).  My mom came with me, as did my husband and oldest son.  We talked about our families, genealogy, and exchanged information.  She even went with us to Saint Gabriel's cemetery to visit family plots.  Sounds boring to non-genealogists, but it was a special memory for me.  And Nancy was one of the sweetest, kindest people I had ever met.  I felt like I had known her for years!  If it hadn't been for Nancy, I would still have a fairly large chunk of my Brown family missing from my tree.

I had felt like I had finally contributed something significant to our tree when I located the grave of our common Brown ancestor.  The grave of Neil and Nancy Brown (nee McCoy) was something we had both been looking for.  I excitedly took pictures and sent an email to her complete with directions on how she could find it.  She was excited and said that she looked forward to being able to visit it the next time she got up to Hazleton from Newark, DE.

She also talked about how she was hurting and had stopped going up and down stairs as much as possible.  I asked how bad she was feeling (my memory is always horrible and I couldn't remember what it was that caused her pain).  Nancy brushed off the question cheerfully.  She was just fine.  She changed the subject to digital scrapbooking and her grandkids.  It was the last I communicated with her.

I don't know why her husband did what he did. She never, ever spoke ill of her husband.  She always spoke fondly of him, her children and grandchildren.  It was clear that he was the love of her life, so hearing the news of her murder was particularly shocking.  I immediately began rationalizing what had happened.

"Hazleton native accuse of killing sleeping wife

Lucille Sukel of Hazleton couldn't understand why her high school classmates weren't returning her e-mails, as they talked every day.

She hadn't heard from Hazleton natives Michael J O'Donoghue and his wife, the former Nancy Brown, in three days, she said.  On Tuesday morning, Sukel found out why.

Michael O'Donoghue, 68, was charged with first-degree murder of his 67-year-old wife, Nancy, in their Newark, Del., home.

O'Donoghue called police early Monday morning - two days after shooting his wife in the back of the head as she was lying in bed, Delaware Online reported.

Police found Nancy O'Donoghue in a second-floor bedroom with bullet wounds and severe blunt force trauma to her head.

Michael O'Donoghue told police that he shot his sleeping wife twice with a small-caliber handgun from his night stand, court papers said.  He also took a hatchet from the garage into the bedroom, in case the gun did not kill his wife, court papers said.

O'Donoghue told police he may have struck his wife in the head with the hatchet after he shot her, investigators said.  He then got into bed and held her, court papers said.  Police recovered a gun and a hatchet in the home.

He is also charged with possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony and possession of a deadly weapon during the commission of a felony.

Nancy (center) at the Knotty Pines

The news shocked friends who graduated in 1960 from St. Gabriel's High School with the couple, leaving them with more questions than answers, Sukel said.

"I have been on the phone with classmates all morning," she said.  "They loved each other very much.  This is the most unexpected thing.  We're in shock."

Sukel remained very close to the couple, despite the miles between them, she said.

"If she was going out shopping, I knew it," Sukel said.

She became concerned when neither answered the e-mails - the last sent Monday night.  Then, Tuesday morning, another classmate learned about the murder and word reached Sukel.

"We're all just astounded," she said.  "None of us could make any sense out of [sic]

Sukel worked with the couple to plan their 50th high school reunion, which was held in June.  The O'Donoghues were on the reunion committee, and Nancy had received a special award for all her hard work on the event, Sukel said.

Michael, who was known to friends as "Jay," had worked as an accountant, and Nancy as a nurse, she said.

Another of Nancy's scrapbook pages (her father)

"Both were retired.  They were happy and contented," Sukel said.

She wishes she could drive to Delaware to ask her friend what happened and why, questions to which she may never know the answers.

Delaware Online, an online edition of The News Journal of Wilmington, contributed to this story.

kmonitz@standardspeaker.com, 570-455-3636"

Published in the Citizens Voice on October 6, 2010

That was the news article.  Her obituary reads much better:

"Nancy O'Donoghue, 67, of Newark, Del., passed away Saturday at her residence.

Born in Hazleton, she was the daughter of the late James and Martha Brown.

Nancy was a graduate of St. Gabriel's High School in 1960 and worked as a registered nurse prior to her retirement.

Another of Nancy's scrapbook pages (her parent's wedding)

Preceding her in death, in addition to her parents, was her son, Patrick.

Surviving are her husband, Michael J.; sons, Dr. Michael and his wife Merih, Maryland; and James and his wife, Catie, Delaware; brothers, William and his wife, Barbara, North Carolina; and James, Arizona; and eight grandchildren.  Several nieces, nephews and cousins also survive.

Friends are invited to attend a Mass of Christian Burial on Saturday at 11 a.m. at Holy Annunciation Parish at St. Gabriel's Church, Hazleton.

Interment will follow at the parish cemetery.

Friends may call at the church from 10 a.m. until the time of the service.

Fierro Funeral Services Inc. is in charge of the arrangements."

Published in the Hazleton Standard-Speaker, October 7, 2010

Today marks the 1st anniversary of Nancy's loss.  It is still unbelievable.  Unreal.  I don't personally know her children or her husband.  I can only imagine what they've been going through and what they are about to go through.  Her husband's trial is set for the first week of November.  I know that it means more news will be out there.  Maybe something to help piece together as to how and why this could have happened, but my thoughts turn to her children and what they are going through.  To have lost their mother, and to see their father on trial for killing her.  It's got to be tearing them up inside.

I don't hold any animosity toward her husband "Jay" either.  I don't know why he killed her, but to have done it in the manner he did and then hold her for so long before calling the police?  My mind wanders to her telling me that she was hurting.  Was it bad enough that he thought he was helping her?  I can't believe that either.  They were both Catholic.  To take a life or to ask that your life be taken is damnable and they would know that.  Would believe that.  I cannot conceive of Nancy asking her husband to do something that would damn him, or her.  So even when I try to make sense of it all, it makes less sense.

I hope that her family is granted the strength they need to make it through all this and to make sure that fond memories are preserved like the beautiful pages in Nancy's scrapbooks.  A beautiful woman.  Never to be forgotten.

[Photos and scrapbook pages used in this blog were either taken by me or shared with me by Nancy.  Most pictures have been cropped to focus solely on Nancy.]

UPDATE:

Is it odd to update a post before it's published?  I had this post written and scheduled to go out and something unbelievable happened.  Nancy's husband just died.  Just a few days before the anniversary of her death.  I don't know why I'm angry.  As I stated before, I'm not angry at him necessarily.  I'm angry at what he did...it was so senseless.  Maybe I'm angry because now we'll never know why.  The trial would have been in a month and I wanted to know why.  Ah well.  Here's his obituary:

"Michael "Jay" O'Donoghue of Newark, Del., and formerly of Hazleton, passes away on Wednesday at Heartland House Hospice, Wilmington, Del.

Forn in Hazleton, he was the son of the late Michael E. and Lucille (Sargent) O'Donoghue.

Jay was a graduate of St. Gabriel's High School.

Preceding him in death, in addition to his parents, were his wife, the former Nancy Brown, and their son, Patrick.

Surviving are his sons, Michael and wife, Merih, Maryland; and James and wife, Catie, Delaware.  Eight grandchildren and several nieces and nephews also survive.

Friends are invited to attend a Mass of Christian Burial on Saturday at 11 a.m. in Holy Annunciation Parish at St. Gabriel's Church, Hazleton.  Interment will follow in the parish cemetery.  The family will receive guests in the church from 10 a.m. until the time of Mass.

Fierro Funeral Service Inc., Hazleton, is handling the arrangements.

In lieu of flowers, memorial donations may be made to the Heartland House Hospice in Wilmington, Del."

Published in the Hazleton Standard Speaker 30SEP2011

Wordless Wednesday - A Repaired Grayscale Photo

 

This is a picture of Mary Laurent nee Dart (my husband's great grandmother).  The original that I scanned has some discoloration so I used my software and used the grayscale tool to re-grayscale the entire image.  Then I used the cloning tool with various degrees of opacity (depending on what blemish I was working on) to fix the rest of the photo.  My auto-correct feature brightened the image after all was done (although this could be done first if you prefer).

After using the grayscale tool

As wordless as I can be!

Amanuensis Monday - A Great Reason to Transcribe...

Last Tuesday I posted about the Rt. Rev. John Brown.  I had wondered who he was, came to some conclusions and vowed to continue my research.  I had a feeling that he was a relative.  As it turns out, I was right.  How did I discover it? 

My mom emailed me because of the John Browns I listed in that post, she recognized the city "Southern Pines, N.C." as being a place many priests were sent on missions.  That made me laugh!  Probably sent to convert the South to Catholicism!  Too funny. 

But even before my mom emailed me with this tid-bit I had already performed another search for John Browns on Ancestry and came up with the following result from the North Carolina Death Collection:

This John was born in Pennsylvania at the right year, never married and was then buried out of state.  Sounds right for my priest, but it wasn't a confirmation, but then the church in Hazleton, PA that buried him responded to my email and told me that the Rev. Brown in their cemetery was buried in September 1986.  So of the John Browns I had found in the SSDI, the Southern Pines John was the right John.  This didn't tell me that he was a relative though. That's where I credit transcribing and taking part in Amanuensis Monday for (once again) saving the day (and an awful lot of time).

I was going to transcribe an obituary.  I knew that.  I wasn't sure which one though.  I had gone through so many this summer while back home and I wanted to start getting them online.  I was a bad girl though and didn't give many of them more than a cursory glance when I first found them.  The trip back home was crammed with family time and genealogy spread in between...not to mention my 10 and 5 year olds.  So now I get to transcribing the obituary for Charles Brown, Sr.

21SEP1935 - Hazleton Standard-Sentinel

"Deaths

Charles B. Brown, Sr.

Charles B. Brown, prominent resident of Hazleton, died at his home, 531 Arthur street, at 2 o'clock on Sunday afternoon after a two months' illness, due to complications.  He was born in this city, where he spent his entire life.

Mr. Brown was bottom foreman for the Lehigh Valley Coal Co. at the Hazleton Shaft colliery for 35 years.  He was a member of St. Gabriel's church and of the Holy Name Society of that parish.  He was a third baseman of the old Hazleton Athletics' team of many years ago.

His wife, formerly Anna LeGrande, died eight years ago.  Surviving are the following children:  Mrs. William McLaughlin, Washington, D. C.; Charles Brown, Jr., of Hazleton; Leo Brown, Cumberland, Md.; Mrs. George Cassidy, Elizabeth, N. J.; Esther and Marian, at home; Mrs. John Hooper, Elizabeth, N. J.; John of Mt. St. Mary's Seminary, Emmittsburg, Md.

Three brothers also survive, Thomas and Neil Brown, of Hazleton, and Patrick Brown of West Hazleton.

The funeral will be held on Wednesday morning at 9 o'clock.  Solemn high mass of requiem will be offered u pin St. Gabriel's church at 9:30, and interment will be made in St. Gabriel's cemetery."

Published in the Hazleton Standard-Sentinel, 21JAN1935

Charles Bernard Brown Sr was my 2nd great uncle.  The brother to my great grandfather, Thomas Brown Sr., and the father to Rev John Brown, which makes John my 1st cousin twice removed.

Of course, his son, John, isn't a priest as of his death, but was going through the seminary.  That's enough to confirm it for me.  Yes, I'll be requesting John's death certificate from North Carolina as well as checking to see if I can get any of the seminary records or find out where he served as a priest.  I'm not overly familiar with all that, so I may be talking to my priest to find out how the Church keeps it's records.

What I will be doing when I go back home next year is looking for the burial/funeral notice for Charles Sr...and John.  It's on my Research Calendar.  I look forward to seeing what else is out there!