I recently went to an air show and took some photos of WWII planes flying overhead.  They had a B-17, B-25, and some smaller fighter planes.  Some of the photos didn’t turn out all that great, but I didn’t just want to toss them, so I decided to try my hand at creating old photos out of them.  Click here to see the final project. Continue reading to see how I achieved it.

Step 1 – Choose the Photo

We need to select a photo.  I think those blurry photos everyone shoots at one point or another works well for this tutorial.  The blur adds a nice realistic touch to the finished photo.  You can always add some blur in Photoshop, but why not use it if it’s already there…one less thing to do.  I also chose a photo that was off-center to give it more of that amateur look.  It was also cloudy and rainy on this particular day which also helped with the overall effect.  If you would like to follow along using the same photo, you can download it here.

Step 2 – Prep the Photo

Out of habit, the first thing I always do is create a duplicate of the photo for safekeeping.  So double-click the background (in the Layers palette) to make this a layer and bring up the New Layer window.  You can name the layer whatever you want or just leave the default layer name, Layer 0.  Once you close that dialog box, right-click on the layer and choose duplicate layer.  Again, name the layer whatever you want.  It’s not that important for this tutorial.  You should now have two identical layers.  Lock the bottom layer if you choose for safekeeping.

Step 3 – Hue/Saturation

Next, I created a new Adjustment Layer by clicking the Create New Fill or Adjustment Layer icon at the bottom of the layers window.  I selected Hue/Saturation… and used the following values.  Also be sure to check the Colorize box.

You should now have something similar to this.

Step 4 – Frame Your Photo

At this point, I framed the photo so I had an idea of what the final project will look like.  I scanned several old photos and cut out their borders to see what looked best and most realistic for the photo.  I thought this one looked the best.  Once you download the file, open it in Photoshop and drag it over to your photo, making sure it’s the top layer as shown here.  Rename the layer Frame.  At this point you will also need to resize the frame as you see fit and position it where you want it, essentially creating the final shot.

Step 5 – Brightness/Contrast

Next, I added a Brightness/Contrast adjustment layer the same way I added the Hue/Saturation layer earlier.  Place the layer above the Hue/Saturation layer, but below the Frame layer.  I added the layer to make the plane look more washed out using the following values:

Brightness:  -47

Contrast:  100

Step 6 – Adding Scratches

I don’t know about you, but I’ve never seen an old photo that didn’t have scratches on it.  Go over to images.google.com and do a search for “scratch texture”.  I came across the image below, but any texture you find should work.  Open the image in Photoshop and drag it to your photo.  Again, be sure the texture is below the Frame layer and above the two adjustment layers.   Name the layer Scratches.

Once you add the Scratches layer, stretch the layer (CTRL + T) to fit the entire photo, change the Blending Mode of the scratches layer to Overlay, and make the Opacity about 50%.  I made 48% in the photo below.  You should now have something like this:

Step 7 – Get Creative!

This is where the creativity comes in.  Using the Burn and Dodge tools along with the Eraser, I edited the scratch texture to get it exactly how I wanted it to look.  The Burn and Dodge tools allow you to darken and lighten areas of the photo.  I find using a larger, soft brush works best here (Size:400, Hardness:0).  You can also add some Dodge and Burn to the Frames layer to make that look a little more worn.  As a final step, I moved my frame into a final position and cropped the photo.  Here’s what I came up with.

Now that you know how to make old from new, send me some links to your projects.  I’d love to see what you come up with!