Resurrecting Edgar Allan Poe | 1849 Daguerreotype Restoration

[@JBColourisation]

Hi! Please let me know what you thought of this video below! Also I hope you'll check out my other similar videos on this channel :)

[@zackariahmayhew8324]

I am amazed of your work. Can you do Anne Frank pitchers

[@Natalia-pc7fm]

Edgar Allen Poe lives on, and not only through his written work, but through this unbelievable restoration!

[@JBColourisation]

Thank you very much indeed! :)

[@bach730]

Great job! It was a good mix of keeping the “old” style with new color tones. I agree on the AI with how you did it. Makes a stark difference with the eyes, but you did it justice by not letting the AI take over the rest of his features.

[@JBColourisation]

Thank you very much! Yes, I felt I had to do everything I could to bring out his eyes, even when in soft focus they're really striking.

[@demondisturbed1173]

God! At last you have been able to upload a video ... I really enjoy what you do and I have been waiting for something from you for a long time ... upload videos more often bro!

[@JBColourisation]

I uploaded one only two weeks ago, if you've not seen it yet I'm quite proud of it! :) I'd love to be able to upload videos more often but this is still only something I can work on in my free time and these videos can be quite time intensive, so for the time being the videos will probably continue to be more occasionally than I'd like. I do have lots more videos planned tho, and I'm really looking forward to sharing them with you all.

[@oo0Spyder0oo]

You should try affinity photo’s frequency separation and see if it fairs better. It’s a powerful tool.

[@TheStockwell]

Great work. I've done work on the 1848 "Whitman" daguerreotype. Note: early photographic images are flipped images. Poe's hair was parted on the left. So, this photo should be flipped to make it accurate. Billy the Kid was famously known as left-handed - until it realized that the famous image of him was - you guessed it! 🐧💙🐧

[@JBColourisation]

Thank you very much for the information, I haven't really worked with daguerreotypes that much before but I'm planning on doing more of them so this information is certainly very helpful to know at a early stage before I worked on others. :)

[@TheStockwell]

@@JBColourisation Thanks for not taking my words as those of a generic know-it-all jerk! I'm not a Poe authority, but I've performed his works - and shown a silent Poe film . . . while playing a hand crafted theremin! I'm also up to my neck in photographic history. I'm getting ready to build a Daguerreotype-style camera to take glass plate negatives. Hey! Maybe someday you'll be restoring one of MY photos! Have a great week - and keep busy; busy is the best. 🐧💙🐧

[@LukeGrimm]

Wonderfully clear and straightforward techniques! I've experimented with "My Heritage AI enhance" feature for old family photos (from the genealogy website) with mixed results; it makes 60% of the images I tried nicer but I found pictures of family members somehow didn't look like them? They were just off enough in 30-40% to make me save the original image until something better comes around.

[@JBColourisation]

Thank you! I think with the speed which AI enhancing is improving, it should only be a few years I would think until it's producing much better results. :)

[@FrodeEgas]

Hey JB Super job... However, I was able to read a family story of Poe, and he had more reddish hair and his face was quite pale while his eyes were almost turquoise in color...

[@GeorgePlaysGTA]

Fantastic! I'm hoping one day you will be able to colour a picture of ol' George.

[@historyofmine]

Wow)) thanks bro

[@JBColourisation]

You're Welcome! :D

[@katydid-zu3pq]

Do you have any suggestions on where to go to get daguerreotypes colorized? Wanting to fix some pictures of my ancestors

[@dennisrios4961]

I really admire your art work. My question: How do you determine what color skin tone to use. Coupled with that how did you determine the "under the eyes" skin tone, which is noticeably a different shade. You do such a good job that I wonder if you just use "a rule of thumb" or just eyeball to what looks good to you. Thanks

[@JBColourisation]

That's very kind of you to say! Well some of it is definitely reference, particularly when looking at things like under eye bags. However even when using reference you'll find a huge range of difference in what can occur in the real world. So for this image I experimented with far more pronounced under eye colour for example and going for a darker red/purple for them. Which, while it could have been technically accurate, i felt it was quite distracting, so I dialed it right back to something which was still realistic but which would not draw the eye so much. It was broadly the same with Poe's skin, although the other way around as I I didn't want him to look too washed out either so i added some extra saturation. I think a lot of colour choice, when you don't have exact reference, is certainly as you say down to experience and what emotion you currently get from the picture/what emotion you'd WANT to get from the picture? (if that makes sense) Thanks for your thoughtful question :)

[@xannondaalder1173]

I hope you listened to Tales of Mystery and Imagination - Edgar Allen Poe by the Alan Parsons Project while making this! :)

[@CraigBoehman]

Fantastic job on the restoration. Always informative. At this point in time, it appears to me that AI is best used selectively. Letting it run the show for an entire edit isn't the kind of auto-pilot that's good for humanity's artistic endeavors.

[@JBColourisation]

Yes I completely agree. I think everyone who works in a creative discipline will probably have to learn how to work alongside AI moving forwards but it's certainly not in a place where the training wheels can be removed at all yet!

[@JanneRanta]

Have you done this indepth colorization with affinity photo? I'm having trouble getting the blending ranges to work how I'd want. AP has a curves like dialog instead of the slider system that PS has.

[@JBColourisation]

I'm afraid I've never used Affinity Photo, so I can't give super useful advice I suspect. I use Photoshop most of the time. Even as someone who hasn't used, or seen in use, Affinity Photo I was just clicking through a few tutorials so that I could see how it worked differently and I found the video "Photoshop Blend If and Affinity Photo Blending Ranges - How They Work" really useful for showing me the comparative differences in how they work. I suspect you may have already seen it, or know the technical side of it however. Sorry i can't be of more assistance!

[@JanneRanta]

@@JBColourisation I actually haven't seen this one yet. Thanks.

[@ThePastorChef]

Looking at this clear picture I believe Pedro Pascal would make a good Poe in a movie. :)

[@ilariabenitto1214]

Riche idée

[@youtubeuser6067]

Please do Darwin and Gregor Mendel.

[@Herbyvore]

Excellent video as always! I've always loved Poe and his work. Did you ever hear about his death and that it's quite mysterious?

[@JBColourisation]

Thank you very much! I've seen the Buzzfeed Unsolved video on it, Poe didn't sound like he had the best luck really. What's your favourite theory?

[@ottovalkamo1]

Why are you on Windows 7?

[@JBColourisation]

it makes me feel closer in history to Edgar Allan Poe.

[@ottovalkamo1]

@@JBColourisation Windows 98 then? 🤠

[@JBColourisation]

@@ottovalkamo1 Given the other unfortunate events in his life I'm pretty sure he was stuck using Windows ME tbh.

[@ottovalkamo1]

@@JBColourisation ;)

[@DivinePonies]

Hm, the area around hair, especially top part of head looks really off. Almost unfinished and smudged. I know it's the very shallow focus of original image that's main cause of this, but when converted into color it really doesn't look good. Overall, pretty amazing work, although I'd personally opt for less interventions to try and keep the original as much as possible. Earlier I watched Baumgartner restore a real painting, so this got me thinking how digital restoration is actually at the very earliest of stages, much like the stuff that Baumgartner deals with when removing old restoration works (the difference between restorations and techniques that happened decades ago and current year restoration that he is doing, is huge). Digital restoration is surely the stuff that will evolve enormously over the years, especially with more and more introduction of AI and digital artists getting more recognition and mainstream influence.

[@hydracdxv]

I dressed of poe

[@LAAGGGGGGG]

Every German emperor

[@timg3504]

Abraham Lincoln