black and white to colour

[SUSZANNAH]

Hi all, does anybody know if it is possible to change a black and white newspaper picture to colour?

 My 2 nieces were in the paper about 11 years ago after the elder saved her younger sister from choking and their dad would like a copy of the picture in colour, I have Paint Shop Pro 7 but can't find  any way to do it with that.......

Any help very much appreciated........

[DavidR]

I have some crayons, but other than that I don't think you will be able to do it. Or at lease not without much difficulty.

Even if you had a very high resolution Black and White photo with good contrast/gray scale (and not a flat low resolution newspaper picture), this would require some very specialised processing. I've heard of it being done with old B&W films being converted to colour but one the quality of the start media (unlike a newspaper picture) is much better.

I don't know PSP (but that is one of the better ones), if your can apply a filter colour over it or try changing the RGB but it will at best be a poor quality as the scanned newspaper image would lack detail.

You might be better trying to contact the newspaper and see if they have either a copy of the original or info about the photographer. It may not have started out as a colour picture.

[SUSZANNAH]

Thanks David, he has already contacted the newspaper with no luck, only just trying to learn psp and this is way over my head.....

The photograph comes out well in Black and White, wish I could have done something as the parents have now split and the girls live with their mother........never mind was worth a try....thanks....

[Gene J]

During my black and white photography days, my very artistic wife would take one of my pictures and color it with water colors. The results were very pleasing. This is the way many early portrait photographers tinted photos before color took over. Give it a try, I think you will be pleasantly surprised.

[mauserme]

Possible - yes.  But very difficult.

In Photoshop you can transfer color from a different pic to the one you want to alter.  So if you have pics with the correct skin tone, hair color, buildings, trees, etc it could theoretically be done.  Maybe Paint Shop Pro is capable of this as well. 

This technique can be used successfully to correct sections of a color image but, realistically, doing it to the entire photo will likely look contrived and unnatural.

This is just my opinion, but I find that a nicely framed black and white picture hanging in a room full of color can be quite nice.  It draws the eye, preserves the drama and, in your case, respects the history.  Just a thought.

[SUSZANNAH]

Thank you all for the input, seems B & W it will have to be.....

[ams]

Try this Suz

http://www.recolored.com/

[SUSZANNAH]

Thanks a lot, this looks really interesting......

Will let you know how I get on......

[ams]

That program has worked for me for a long time. This took me about 2 mins to do.

Before:
http://www.deviantart.com/view/27778936/

After:
http://ams.sdf1.org/bh.jpg

EDIT: Fixed links.

[SUSZANNAH]

Well I downloaded it and had problems, it froze my system 3 times, no idea what was causing it? So it looks like I am back to black and white........

Thanks for the input, much appreciated.

[ams]

I dont know what the problem is, I just installed it on my test box and my laptop. Works fine for me, is there another computer you can try it on?

NOTE: Fixed broken links above.

[SUSZANNAH]

No not really only have access to this one......