Restored a 100-year-old photo of my great-grandfather’s unit (Warsaw, c. 1920). Original vs. Manual Repair vs. AI Colorization.

Hi everyone! I wanted to share a personal restoration project. I found this photo in an old family album made by my grandmother. It shows my great-grandfather Marian (the soldier marked with a drawn line ) and his fellow officers standing in front of a "PKP Warszawa" train. If you look closely, you can even see the military cook in the train window!

I decided to bring this piece of family history back to life. Here is the breakdown:

1. Original: Straight from the 100-year-old album. It had a lot of scratches, tears, stains, and fading.
2. Manual Restoration: I spent time manually cleaning up all the physical damage (dust, scratches, bends, tears). I wanted to preserve the original details and historical authenticity without altering the scene.
3. Colorized: Finally, I ran the manually cleaned version through an AI colorization tool, just to get a glimpse of what they might have looked like in real life.

Instead of hiding the photos back in a drawer, I printed them out and turned them into fridge magnets. Now, my ancestors accompany me in my everyday life.