Digital photo magic: easy image retouching and restoration for librarians, archivists and teachers

Aimed at information professions, Digital Photo Magic suggests an alternative, free and low-cost software for photo editing. The programs offered are for a Windows-based environment and are chosen for easy use. The examples are accompanied by work plans and step-by-step operating procedures. Perez highlights the best features in each program and gives tips on how best to use them for a particular project.

Introductory chapters include information on copyright and obtaining royalty-free photos. Perez stipulates the need to resolve any copyright or legal issues before using anyone else’s images. There is also a list of websites that contain royalty-free photo collections. He also recommends using standardized systems and indexing to manage library photo collections, including storage and preservation practices. Concern about the accurate portrayal of visual reality is raised as well the maintenance of a collection of the original materials.

In Chapter 3, Perez takes various tasks and walks the reader through the software and the process to achieve fixes for common problems such as brightness, sharpening, noise reduction and spot removal. He then gives sequences to achieve the best post-processing fixes. One example is removing a person blocking a landscape shot of a beach and have the software fill in the background – approximate editing time of 20 s.

Image quality file formats are covered in Chapter 4. Here, there is a useful table giving the uses, benefits and drawbacks for TIFF, JPEG and PNG files. His tip for JPEG files is to save the original and then work from a high-quality copy. This is because of the high rate of degradation each time a JPEG file is saved.

The software recommendations are listed in Chapter 5 under categories of different photo-editing levels: high-end and mid-level. Also included are automated, online and special purpose photo editors. Perez indicates the usefulness of the software with a grading system.

Nine recommended software products are selected in Chapter 6, first by covering the main features in the products with then and now photos of the product in action. Next, Perez chooses a single photo and demonstrates a retouch project through instructions and screen shots using several tools. These projects include removing unwanted people and objects, complexion smoothing, adding color filters and cleaning up spots and marks on old photos.

The book is useful to all levels of photo-editing skill with the introduction of photo-editing techniques and giving ideas for improving photos for digital or print reproduction. It gives alternatives to the cost and learning curve for master programs such as Photoshop and Lightroom.

The index includes the software covered, issues such as copyright and ethical considerations and the specific operations required. The only shortcoming is that apps are not covered. However, there is an associated website with additional online resources that Perez has come across since the publication of this book. These include specialized websites, blogs and user forums. www.update4dpm.com/text/index.htm