Rippling photo problem

[Bagpuss]

A customer popped in this morning with this A4 size photo of his Grandad, it had been mounted about 20 years and there are distinct ripples underneath the photo. The mount is securely stuck to the backing board, the only way I could possibly get the photo out is to use a scalpel and cut the photo out but I cannot tell if it's been stuck at the edges or on the back. If I got lucky, the photo might flutter out and I could then try and drymount it to remove the rippling.

I haven't done this yet, I said I'd get back to the customer with suggestions. I get the impression he would not want to send it to a conservator, does anyone have any other suggestions ? An alternative might be to get the photo photographed and "touched up" .

thanks in advance,
Adam (Bagpuss)[

[swanlinnet]

Hi

I'd Scan it and run it through photoshop. It seems that would be the best. You could then let him/her keep the 'old' version' and just frame the new one for him/her.

hope this helps, Vince

[Roboframer]

You could set the blade depth of your mountcutter to score the mount in sections as deep as poss without going through and then peel the sections away from the image until all you are left with is is a very thin layer which again can be peeled away from the photo so that you can see what you are up against underneath.

[David]

I had a problem where an old photo had stuck to the glass in a frame. We ended up scanning it, through the glass, then a lot of touching up. The resulting print was probably better than the original had ever been. I'd scan and print it.

David.

[fineedge]

...had a number of these. they are often stuck with a hard brittle glue which has failed in areas and even if you do get it off the backing the photo paper remains wobbly. I tend to take a photo of the photo, load the raw file into pshop to edit out any blemishes, adjust the colour balance to keep it looking "old" and reprint.

[prospero]

This seems to be the normal practice in years gone by. An artist's palette knife is handy for persuading the mount off. It's thin and springy but not sharp. Slip over the mount window and twist gently, working your way along. It allows you to feel where the glue is.

[markw]

I suspect if it was glued to the mount 20 years ago then the glue will be fairly robust - The old starch glue goes back a bit further than 20 years and when encountered can often be persuaded to release its grip - as described by Prospero - palet knife eased under the edge of the mount. Lions plastic bone as used to burnish tape down etc also works well as the rounded edges are fairly gentle and used carefully will ease the mount away from the pic.

For more modern - normally more aggressive adhesives gentle heat can work - being careful to make sure that the photo isnt damaged in the process. last resort would be to cut the photo out of the mount - you will often find that the adhesive doesnt go right to the edge of the mount and that you can cut just outside the aperture area thereby making it possible to remount without losing any of the original image.

The ruckled image when released will have to be flattened. A vacuum press set to a fairly low temperature can work wonders and you can often get photos back to a very presentable condition. Depending on how far your customer wants to go with conserving the photo will dictate how you keep it flat. Ruckled prints can often be flattened and look great for a few hours - but seem to keep a slight memory of their ruckled state. Dry mounting is often the only effective way of keeping them flat.

[An Old Master]

Bit of a job dry mounting a door - that hinge is going to do some serious damage to your vacuum press.

[markw]

Old master going blind - poor old thing.

[Perfection]

Same as other replies - I've just had 2 very similar jobs and scanned both of them. After Photoshoping out the damage, if you print to a decent fine art paper, the result will be tons better than the original - ours certainly were and customers were very happy.

Paul

[Roboframer]

Scanning is all well and good but wouldn't it be nice/better to scan just the photo and not the mount as well - i.e. the photo is pressed flat (as possible) against the scanner glass?

If you wreck the mount by removing it, it doesn't matter and the backing could probably be removed, layer by layer from the back as well.

Whether scanning or photographing it would be nice to be able to give the customer the choice of framing a reproduction or the original removed from its mount and backing - and if it's the original to be framed then it can stil be scanned/photographed and saved.

Personally I'd want the original framed - the exact same thing that was on (e.g.) my Gran's wall; not a copy of what was on my Gran's wall.

It's survived this long with nasty materials and methods and if you can remove those then it's going to survive at least as long again with better materials and methods.

[Custard]

If this is a silver gelatin print why couldn't it be just soaked off the mount?

[Bagpuss]

Many thanks for all your thoughts on this, I have now taken a good quality photo of it just to be safe. I would like to try and release it from the mount, it would be good experience, I'll see what the customer wants me to do.

If I did want to get it printed off, can anyone suggest an online site that would do quality photo prints ? Along the line of www.truprint.co.uk where I can upload the file but for more "upmarket" photo printing, it would be useful for the future.

Thanks,
Adam

[stcstc]

i can do prints for you, although i am in ireland

I do high end photo prints, not run of the mill stuff

but sure there must be someone else on here who does this too who would be closer

[marct]

for a more professional print you could try somewhere like loxleycolour.com we get all of our large prints done there and the quality is excellent. Our Lab printer only goes up to 12" width.

[Bagpuss]

Well I spoke to Steve Goodhall at HotPress yesterday and told him I had attempted to cut the photo out of the mount, unfortunately the photo didn't flutter out as I had hoped, it was still stuck down in patches. I then cut through the board and released the photo on the board. Steve suggested I put it in the Hotpress from cold, let it reach normal temperature and run with pump on for 15 mins. The end result was alot better I must admit but I then decided to scan it A4 size, the photo this time didn't show any rippling that I could see and I'll be sending it off for printing. Had I used the original photo I took I would have spent a couple of hours in Photoshop trying to correct it

Thanks again for the advice.
Adam

[David]

I use photobox and have always found the quality and service excellent. Delivery is usually one or two days.
http://www.PhotoBox.co.uk

David.

[Steve Goodall]

Well I spoke to Steve Goodhall at HotPress yesterday and told him I had attempted to cut the photo out of the mount, unfortunately the photo didn't flutter out as I had hoped, it was still stuck down in patches. I then cut through the board and released the photo on the board. Steve suggested I put it in the Hotpress from cold, let it reach normal temperature and run with pump on for 15 mins. The end result was alot better I must admit but I then decided to scan it A4 size, the photo this time didn't show any rippling that I could see and I'll be sending it off for printing. Had I used the original photo I took I would have spent a couple of hours in Photoshop trying to correct it

Thanks again for the advice.
Adam

Great news Adam - I am glad you called me - running up from cold was certainly the best way to go - rather than pressing straight from hot - I can reccomend some pro printers if you are still looking around - just email me at my normal hot press address...

[Bagpuss]

Thanks for the heads up David, I used Photobox for the first time on Sunday and had my A4 print delivered this morning, a very good service I was surprised that Truprint didn't offer A4 size, I'll use Photobox in future.

cheers
Adam