How To Edit Yellowish Photos: Restore Old Pictures Easily

When we take a photo, we’re freezing a moment in time, hoping to preserve it forever. Unfortunately, nothing lasts forever, and over time, printed photos can deteriorate—black-and-white images often turn yellow, while color photos may fade into magenta hues, losing their original vibrancy. 

Thankfully, modern editing software allows us to fully restore old photos and bring them back to life. In this article, we’ll use Luminar Neo and guide you through the entire process with a step-by-step tutorial. Let’s get started!

Step 1: Scan or Photograph Your Print

First, we need to digitise your photo, which means getting your printed photo onto your computer. There are a couple of methods to achieve this, so let’s take a look.

Scanner

The easiest method is to use a flatbed scanner to bring your photo onto your computer.

1. Clean: Gently wipe away any dust from the photo for a clearer scan. Be sure to avoid using liquids, a microfibre cloth will do a good job.

2. Place Photo: Most scanners require you to place the photo in the top-left corner of the glass, but double-check your user manual.

3. Settings: This is an important step to ensure you get a high-quality scan.
   
   Resolution: Choose a high DPI (dots per inch), around 600 DPI, to allow for detailed restoration or enlargements.
   
   Colour Mode: If available, use 24-bit Colour, even if your photo is black and white, as this can preserve more detail.
   
   File Format: Opt for TIFF for a high-quality, uncompressed file. These files are larger, but ideal for restoration. If you need a smaller file, JPEG is an option, just bear in mind it will be compressed.

4. Preview: At this stage, you can straighten and crop the photo to make sure the file looks right before editing.

5. Scan: Hit the scan button and you should see a perfect copy of your photo on your computer. Be sure to back it up and save a copy.

Take a Photo of Your Photo

The other method can be a little trickier, especially without the right setup.

1. Lighting: Find soft, even lighting, ideally near a window. Avoid glare from direct sunlight or reflections.

2. Align the Photo: Make sure you're shooting directly above the photo without any skew or distortion. Take several shots and, if possible, use a tripod to ensure consistency.

3. High Resolution: Use the highest image quality available on your camera or phone. Wipe your lens to avoid dust spots.

4. Crop: Once you’ve taken the photo, import it into Luminar Neo. Carefully crop away any of the surface the photo was resting on, and straighten along both axes to remove distortion.

Step 2: Import into Luminar Neo

1. Import: Open Luminar Neo and import your image. Head to the Catalogue window and click the Add Photos button.

2. Crop: Crop and straighten the image if needed, and you’ll be ready to start restoring.

Step 3: Fix the Yellow Tint

Now we can begin restoring the image, and the good news is that it’s simple and easy to do inside Luminar Neo.

1. Develop: Go to Develop and open the Colour menu. Here, you’ll find the Temperature slider. Gradually decrease it towards the cooler side. Make small adjustments until the yellow tint starts to fade and the colors look more neutral.

2. Colour Harmony: Luminar Neo also offers advanced temperature controls in the Professional section, under Colour Harmony. You can begin with the Warmth slider for a general adjustment. For more precision, use the Split Colour Warmth sub-menu to adjust warmer and cooler tones separately. Move the Warm slider slightly towards green to neutralize the yellow tones without affecting the cooler areas too much. This gives you more control than a global temperature shift and helps achieve a more balanced, natural result.

Step 4: Restore Contrast and Detail

One issue that can occur in old photos is a loss of contrast due to the fading of the print. We might also lose details through deterioration over time or during the scanning process. Thankfully, this can be restored in Luminar Neo.

1. Contrast: Head back to Develop and find Smart Contrast near the top of the menu. This tool helps restore depth to your photo without making it look too harsh or unnatural.

2. Highlights and Shadows: Make sure the highlights and shadows are balanced by adjusting their respective sliders, or by using the Tone Curve tool for more precise control.

3. Details: One of the best tools for restoring texture is Structure AI, which adds clarity and detail while keeping the result looking natural. You can also use the Details tool, which allows you to adjust small, medium and large details separately for extra control.

4. Enhance: For a quick and easy improvement, try the Enhance AI tool. It analyses your image and boosts the areas that need attention, giving it that extra sparkle with just one click.

Step 5: Recover Faded Colours

If your image still feels a bit flat or lacking in detail, it may be due to the loss of contrast or texture over time. Luminar Neo offers powerful tools to recover these details.

1. Vibrance: Use the Vibrance slider found in the Colour tool to bring back some of the life in the image. This tool adjusts the tones that are lacking in intensity without oversaturating the image.

2. Structure AI: One of the best tools for restoring texture and detail is Structure AI. This tool enhances clarity and sharpness in the photo while maintaining a natural look, bringing back the lost detail without overdoing it.

3. Tone Curve: Adjust the Tone Curve to fine-tune the overall contrast of the image, adding depth to your photo and recovering shadow details that may have faded.

Step 6: Clean Up Blemishes

If your image has imperfections such as dust spots, scratches, or wear from age, you can easily clean them up in Luminar Neo.

1. Generative Tools (GenErase): GenErase is a powerful tool that can remove defects by reading the surrounding areas and making intelligent adjustments. It’s quick and effective for erasing spots or damage.
   

2. Portrait Retouching:  If your photo includes portraits and the skin needs some touch-up, use Luminar Neo’s Skin and Face tools for smoothing, blemish removal, and enhancing the facial features.

Step 7: Sharpen and Finish

Finally, let’s apply the finishing touches to restore the image. By this stage, the photo should be looking as close as possible to its original state, with neutralized yellowing and enhanced detail.

1. Sharpening: Ensure your image looks crisp and the details are well-defined by heading to Develop and adjusting the Sharpness slider.
   

2. Denoise: If your image is grainy or noisy, use the Denoise tool to restore fine details and improve image quality, making it ready for printing.

3. Exporting: Now your image should be looking perfect and ready to print. The final and most important step is to export it with the correct settings.

• Sharpen: High

• Resize: Original

• File Format: If you are looking to preserve fine detail and send your image to a professional print lab, choose TIFF. For everyday use and home printing, JPEG will work just fine.

• Resolution: 300 pixels per inch

• Quality: 100

The Bottom Line

There we have it. Your aged and weathered photo should now be looking brand new, almost as if it was taken yesterday. Restoring photos is, thankfully, a manageable and straightforward task thanks to the tools available inside Luminar Neo. It offers a great deal of control over tones and hues, which is especially helpful when dealing with faded or yellow-tinted images. Fading can also affect the depth of a photo, but this too can be recovered using tools like Smart Contrast. Give these tools a go for yourself and look forward to the results!