On first page of son James Stillman's photo book is this 2" x 3" photo of Charles Stillman, founder of Brownsville, Texas.
The rounded photo corners were squared and sepia removed. It appears someone attempted to darken in eyebrow and facial hair lines but stopped before causing more damage. These lines are not as visible until magnified. Contrast was also engaged to enhance photo and background lighten to delineate coarse of hair around his head. Some darker areas (eyes mouth) sacrificed a minimum of detail.
Charles Stillman was 54 years old when this photo was taken. The object of this colorized process is to convey his age through the graying blond color of hair and beard. With blue pen lines removed it became a matter of laying down base colors (back ground, skin and coat).
Caucasian men tend to have pinkish skin that reddens with a little sun baking which is what our subject was accustomed to in South Texas. Acquiring the correct tone of skin isn't always easily achieved when compared to actual skin textures and colors of modern photos.
The most tedious stage of this restoration came from removing tiny dirt-dots and "cleaning" dark lines around mouth to smooth out the quality of photo. Most importantly, the object of this enhancement was to add dimension to his eyes. In this case it was adding a simple glow or glimmer to each eye.
This was my first attempt a couple of years ago. The scan was taken from a page copied from a book printed in 1954. It was until recently that the original photo was acquired and thus a second chance to do it right.
Here is a sketch drawing made from photo in 1962.
