Breathing Life Into Old Family Photos: How to Colorize Black & White Images in Photoshop

Breathing Life Into Old Family Photos: How to Colorize Black & White Images in Photoshop

I have a shoebox of my grandmother’s old photographs sitting on a shelf in my Seattle apartment. Black and white, slightly faded, full of people I half-recognize. Every time I look at them I wonder what the colors actually were. The grass, the dresses, the sunlight. For the longest time I assumed bringing that color back required either expensive software or serious artistic skill I didn’t have. Then I came across a technique that changed how I think about the whole problem entirely.

Giant Heads, Birthday Cakes, and the Photoshop Skills Behind a Viral Promo Photo

Giant Heads, Birthday Cakes, and the Photoshop Skills Behind a Viral Promo Photo

Every so often a photo stops people mid-scroll. You know the kind. Someone posts it, the comments flood in, and half of them are just “wait, how?” That’s exactly what happened when the team at PHLEARN put out their fifth anniversary promo image - a surreal, oversized-head-meets-giant-birthday-cake composite that looked equal parts chaotic and polished. The requests for a breakdown came pouring in, so Aaron Nace did what he does best and made a tutorial out of it.