Two photos now: My great grandfather, on bicycle with his pet owl
Last edited Sun Sep 29, 2024, 11:26 AM - Edit history (2)
My great-grandfather was a forest ranger. In the picture he is on his daily patrol with his pet owl, who sits on a special stick, so they can ride together.
Found another of them:
= new reply since forum marked as read
Handsome man and owl 
Oh, never mind -- the 2nd photo shows all of it. 
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... having worked in the graphics industry for 60 years, and I still work with PhotoShop daily. The lighting is consistent between the image of your great grandfather and the near background, as is the foreshortening of the scenery in general, and the transition between the ground on which he's standing is seamless. It wouldn't be in a studio shot. In the early 20th century, as beautifully as they could paint theatrical scenery, it is always immediately recognizable as such. And then there would be the question, what would be the point? He works outdoors every day, so why not shoot the pix outdoors? Though you're right, the bike in the first shot does look strangely truncated. On closer inspection, though, one can see a pedal and the spokes of the back wheel, as well as the seat and the shadows of both wheels. It is a visual mish-mosh, but it's all there, it's just that the frame of the bike is directly behind the front wheel and handlebars. So mystery solved!
You're welcome!
And I LOVE owls! That looks like a great horned owl.
What a treasure.
... though it was spelled "Uglius", since the Danish name for owl is "Ugle" 
. Legend has it, that he could pronounce his own name back perfectly.
My wife is the family genealogist. This has brought her many family photos for possible addition to the genealogy family tree.
Those photos that are of critical ancestors, Grandparents and GGparents and GGGparents. We have tried to improve them for future generations.
I have done many of them with readily available software for editing photos on your phone or computer.
But for those really key photos that have been neglected for years, there are websites that will do professional restorations for a fee, of course.
For this Owl-Bike and Grandfather photo, I just did a two-minute tweak to show how pictures like these could be restored for future generations. I lightened it up a little and added color to his face.
If you send me a DU email, I will point you to the photo restoration software I have used on my Android phone and tell you what to Google to find online photo restoration websites.
Most on-site restorers will quote you a price and allow you one or more additional tweaks for the contracted price. For example, we had a 58-year-old photo of my wife and me at a military ball on her college campus. I was wearing my USAF Class A uniform and asked them to improve the color of the faded USAF blue. The first revision had my wife's ball gown perfect. But my uniform color was way off-color. So, I sent them a picture from the USAF Blues website, and the revision tweak turned out perfectly.
