Mom in New York Subway Station (Digitally Rescued Photo)

Mom in New York Subway Station (Digitally Rescued Photo) Originally uploaded by randubnick

This image started with a snapshot in my mother's album. She met my father in during World War II. (He was from Brooklyn, but was stationed briefly in Pueblo, where she lived.) They married and had a honeymoon in New York City. This photo was taken during that trip, probably by my father. My mother started her album the day they met, and included pictures of their courtship, wedding, and honeymoon. After my father went overseas, she included pictures he sent her from Europe, and pictures of what she was doing in Colorado. She labeled each photo, in white ink on black paper. Well, if it weren't for her labels, I would have had no idea what this was, because the original snapshop was a small indistinct square of gray, with a diagonal pattern in it. Her label read "Dim of me in NY Subway." Although you couldn't really see her (or anything else) in the snapshot, she put it in the album all the same, so I figured this must have been an important memory. So tonight, I decided to try to rescue the photo. I scanned it into the computer and adjusted the contrast. I could see the letters (OGA AVE), so I guessed this must near Saratoga Avenue in Brooklyn, where my dad grew up. I could also see two figures and more of the subway station. I liked the long diagonals and the patterns of the windows. I opened the image in Painter and tried equalizing it , and suddenly got more contrast, and more clarity, as well as some interesting colors and effects. Then I used digital chalk to clean up a fold in the photo, and cropped the image to get this composition. So there's my mother, in the foreground. I don't know who the second person is, probably a stranger waiting for the subway. Both figures are indistinct, almost transparent, but I like the effect. Although I can't see my mother clearly, I know she is there, just the same. Her birthday was in early November, so rescuing this snapshot is a kind of (very, very belated) birthday gift, and a way of spending a little time with her, even though she has been gone now for over twenty years.