Will three or four generations posed in a studio or on the front steps still look like themselves after the fading is removed?

The prompts keep every face, age and expression in the faded family portrait as photographed. Where the faded area covered a face, compare the result with other family portraits and with family memory before you print.

Do I need to scan faded family portraits?

A flat scan is best, but a phone photo of the faded family portrait works too; run Photo-of-a-Photo Fixer first to crop and remove glare, then repair the fading.

How many credits does a faded family portrait take?

The 4 free credits on a new account cover one Standard restoration of faded family portraits. Pro and Max return more detail on every face, the seating order and the clothing where the fading was heavy; see pricing for the current amounts.

Can I colorize the family portrait after fixing the fading?

Yes. Repair the faded family portrait first, then run the Photo Colorizer on the result. Colors are inferred from the era and the materials in the repaired faded family portraits, so type any remembered colors into the hints field.

Family Portraits

Faded Family Portraits

When fading reaches a family portrait, the result is milky shadows, grey whites and a cast that drifts toward orange, magenta or cyan depending on the paper. The cause is nearly always dye layers breaking down over decades, faster in warmth and daylight, and family portraits kept in albums, frames and boxes were all exposed to it.

The restoration reads the faded family portrait as a repair job: it removes the fading and rebuilds what was underneath from the surrounding grain, keeping every face, the seating order and the clothing as photographed. Faces of three or four generations posed in a studio or on the front steps that were lost to the fading are plausible reconstructions, so compare them with other pictures.

For faded family portraits the order is fading first, faces second, upscale last, each step taking the previous result. Standard suits a family portrait for a screen; Pro or Max gives a faded print more detail for reprinting.

Open with these settings Faded Photo Fixer

Faded Family Portraits, the original print

OriginalRestored

Original on the left, restored on the right; hover to see more of the repair. Made in the Studio from a scan of the print.

What matters for these photos

Small faces of three or four generations posed in a studio or on the front steps that the fading has taken the detail from
Faded family portraits that a copy shop refused to touch
A faded family portrait needed for a memorial, an anniversary or a reprint
Milky shadows, grey whites and a cast that drifts toward orange, magenta or cyan depending on the paper, spread over a family portrait

Suggested order of passes

01
Remove the fading
Faded Photo Fixer targets milky shadows, grey whites and a cast that drifts toward orange, magenta or cyan depending on the paper while keeping every face, the seating order and the clothing in the family portrait untouched.
Faded Photo Fixer
02
Repair the rest of the family portrait
Photo Restoration addresses the usual wear on family portraits, a crack through the middle from a broken frame, silver mirroring in the shadows and a lost corner, once the fading is gone.
Photo Restoration
03
Upscale the family portrait for reprinting
Adds the pixels a wall print needs after the fading repair, with the shape of the faded family portraits unchanged.
Image Upscaler