Will the people in my wartime photo still look like themselves?

The prompts instruct the restoration to keep every face, age and expression in a wartime photo as photographed. Where a face in wartime photos was tiny or badly blurred the result is a plausible reconstruction, so check it against other photos and family memory before printing.

Can I colorize wartime photos?

Yes. Run the Photo Colorizer after the repair. Colors on a wartime photo are inferred from the era and the materials, so if anyone remembers a dress or a car color, type it into the known-colors field.

What does restoring a wartime photo cost?

One Standard run of any tool on wartime photos is covered by the 4 free credits a new account starts with. Pro and Max use more credits and return more detail on a wartime photo; the pricing page has the current numbers.

Subjects

Restore old wartime photos

Q: Which tool should I start with for wartime photos?

Scratch & Tear Repair is the usual first step for a wartime photo; it addresses tiny contact prints, censor marks, folds from being mailed in a letter and fading from a mantelpiece. Chain a second tool in the Studio if the print needs more.

Wartime photos are usually the photographs a family would run back into the house for: a soldier at camp, a sweetheart back home or a family in a bombed street, printed anywhere from the 1910s to 1940s. The wartime photos that survive tend to show tiny contact prints, censor marks, folds from being mailed in a letter and fading from a mantelpiece.

Upload the wartime photo as a scan or a phone photo, and the restoration comes back in seconds with the uniform, the date on the back and the handwriting kept as they were in the original. Faces in wartime photos that were badly blurred are plausible reconstructions, so compare them against other pictures of the same people.

Standard is enough for a wartime photo headed for a screen; Pro and Max recover more detail for a print that will hang on a wall. Whichever tier you choose, run wartime photos through the upscaler last so the reprint stays sharp.

Open with these settings Scratch & Tear Repair

Restore old wartime photos, 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

Tiny contact prints, censor marks, folds from being mailed in a letter and fading from a mantelpiece
Small faces of a soldier at camp, a sweetheart back home or a family in a bombed street, which fall apart when enlarged
Color casts on wartime photos from the 1910s to 1940s that hide the real skin tones
The uniform, the date on the back and the handwriting, which must stay as photographed while the damage is repaired

Suggested order of passes

01
Run Scratch & Tear Repair on the wartime photo
The first pass for wartime photos: it takes on tiny contact prints, censor marks, folds from being mailed in a letter and fading from a mantelpiece while keeping the uniform, the date on the back and the handwriting as photographed.
Scratch & Tear Repair
02
Repair what the first pass left on the wartime photo
Photo Restoration picks up the remaining marks on wartime photos without touching the tone or grain elsewhere.
Photo Restoration
03
Sharpen the faces of a soldier at camp, a sweetheart back home or a family in a bombed street
Recovers eye and skin detail in wartime photos; keep it at natural strength unless the faces are tiny.
Face Restoration
04
Upscale the wartime photo for reprinting
Adds the pixels a framed print or enlargement of wartime photos needs, with the shape of the upload unchanged.
Image Upscaler