Video: Photo Restoration and Colorization Demonstrated Through a Time-Lapse

Digital image editing technology — culturally controversial uses aside — has enabled us to do some pretty amazing things. In the past, we shared a video that showed how the Internet came together to restore a WWII veteran’s Navy photo to its former glory.

This time, we get to see the process in action, as Redditor thehatersalad shows us the impressive restoration and colorization work he did on an old photo of user f2ISO100‘s grandmother — time-lapse style.

The actual process took some two to two and a half hours, but in the video above we get to see it all take place in just over seven minutes. From fixing the cracks and creases, to basically re-creating her arms, to the colorization process, the video covers it all.

Here’s the before and after:

restoration1

As you might expect, his work didn’t go unappreciated. “I don’t know what kind of emotion you hope to elicit with these, but you made me catch my breath,” said f2ISO100 when she saw the final product. “I feel — for the first time — like I got to see her, back in time. This is so, so beautiful. Thank you so much!”

In addition to the gratitude he gets for doing this kind of work, for thehatersalad, taking on project like this is also simply about getting in the practice. To see more of his work, check out his Reddit profile and browse through some of the other things he’s submitted to r/colorization.

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