What restoration can and can’t fix

The page for funeral photo restoration is where a family makes the portrait. This guide is the shorter question people ask in the days before a service: what can actually be lifted, and what should be left alone.

What can be lifted in a few days

Scratches, dust, creases, and fading can lift when the face is still in the photograph. A soft scan can look clearer. A stained mount can be replaced with a quiet studio background, which also removes objects near the person. Keep the original background when a place, a uniform, or an object is part of the picture you want in the room.

Families often have a few days, sometimes an afternoon. The preview is watermarked and usually ready in a few minutes, so you can look at it beside the original before anyone pays. If it does not look like them, stop.

What stays as it was

The tools are instructed to leave facial features, expression, and hair as they were. If a result would change the shape of the face, that result is refused and the face from the photograph is the one that is kept. Look at the eyes and the mouth, not only at a cleaner background.

Color stays off unless you ask. Automatic color can change skin tone and slightly alter facial features. Color already painted on the photograph is kept when color is left off. The note on that choice is Colorize a black-and-white funeral photo.

Paid files stay for a limited time and are then deleted on the schedule described on the privacy page. An unpaid preview is deleted sooner.

A very small photograph can still be redrawn, because there is not enough detail to recover. The site says so before you continue. A clearer picture is worth looking for first. Enlarge a photo for a 16×20 easel explains what a large print can honestly hold.

What you are looking at

This is a still photograph. An optional set of clips can add slight movement later. There is no music, and the person does not speak. The portrait does not add a name, a date, or a verse.

If the service is tomorrow, the timing note is A funeral photo needed tomorrow. The files themselves are the memorial portrait: program, easel, prayer card, bookmark, obituary, and a 16:9 still.