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Old Photographs, Recognition, Handwriting Deciphering => Free Photo Restoration & Date Old Photographs => Topic started by: cmcm1 on Friday 14 March 08 05:44 GMT (UK)
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hi can you help please
the guy with the bow tie lost part of his ear in the war photo taken about 1927
there were 4 men from this family that were in ww1 but I only have these two photos
any help
Thank you
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IMHO they are different men
The nose and ear are different dispite the age gap
Di
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Only personal opinion so no one please shout at me ;D ;D ;D
I think they are the same person
The chin shape is the same, the younger man is already developing the tell tale bag shape under the eyes and the top of the left ear on the younger man is the same shape and curl as the ear on the older man. The nose is always difficult as it spreads as we get older. Mouth is almost identical.
It is difficult to tell precisely without overlaying the photos - perhaps we have an expert lurking somewhere with that technology? ???
I think your problem arises with the fact that the other options are from the same family - so it will be very likely that they will have similar characteristics! :-\
100% sure, no - but certainly a lot of likely facial matches.
Will probably be one of those ongoing mysteries until technology tells you otherwise - thanks for sharing the photos though.
Su
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Hi,
This is a difficult one, because so few things are possible to compare. You can't compare the damaged ear, nor the top lip because one of the men has a moustache, nor the shape of the head because of the hat. Also the tilt of the head is slightly different making it impossible to compare the shape and position of the nostrils. Despite that, I don't think that these are two pictures of the same man. The chins are quite similar, which suggests a possible family connection, however, despite the man on the left having lost at least part of one ear, it looks like the other ear is quite close to the head near the ear lobe, and further from the head at the top of the ear. The other man has ears that stick out from the head at the bottom and the top of the ear. I did consider that this might be an effect of his hat, but usually this just makes the top of the ear poke out.
The man in the bow tie has his head at a very slight angle to the photographer, which makes it impossible to see the lobe of the ear that hasn't been damaged, but I think that if the other man was turned at the same slight angle, you would still see a bit of the bottom part of the ear.
I've tried fiddling around with the pictures to overlay one with the other, and I'm sorry the software I have isn't brilliant, but here are my efforts. I do think that these men could be very closely related but the bit to look out for is the difference in the shape and position of the ears in the red/green transparency. My personal feeling is that the difference is too much to be explained by the slight forward tilt of the 'ear' mans head. The lines on the first photo are part of my checking that they are lined up as closely as possible.
Any comments?
Regards
KJ
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Hi Kate
Brilliant analysis - as you have said hat/tilt/etc very difficult to judge. The overlays do help look at key points though.
Ear does appear now to be in a slightly lower position as well.
Poss then a member of the same family but not the same man?
Any comments from cmitmcm? Certainly a good puzzle that you have set! ???
Su
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thank you all so much for your help,
we had an family emergency
so sorry I didn't get back sooner
awesome work KateJones how do you do that
we know of atleast 3 men from the same family that were in ww1 but don't have photo's of all
any idea how old the man in the uniform would be that might narrow it down a little
Thank you all again so much sorry for getting back sooner
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Hi cmitmcm
I do hope your family emergency is over and are ok! :)
I would guess the man to be about 19/20/21 very difficult - he has such a youthful complexion.
Do you know if they all/any survived the war?
Presumably at least one - as you have a photo of an older man ???
Su
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Hi KJ
here's the photo I PM you about which one do you think he is also how did you do the overlaying ??
Thanks again for all you help everyone
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Hi, received your PM, I'm afraid that my classes are waiting, and I've only checked in while I saved some work onto a USB drive for my A level class today. I'll have a look at this later on.
I'm actually using a fairly old computer which wheezes a lot, and gets upset if you try and ask it to do very much at any one time, so I've been using an old version of MS PhotoDraw for the transparency, and changing the colour of the picture. For cutting out sections and adding the comments I'm using software called SnagIt, which allows you to take cut out sections of screen and add comments (in fact it's far cleverer than that, but I'm still finding my feet with it - I only went on the course very recently). There are of course, quite a few programs which will do the same sort of thing as both of these.
By the way, just a gut feeling, nothing more at the moment - I think the guy on the left is more likely to be the same one as the one in the middle. The man on the right has more arched eyebrows, and the 'corner' of his jaw juts out more.
Oh, I agree about the likely age for the man in uniform - very difficult to tell, but I would go with 20 plus or minus one or two .
Can I ask what resolution you've scanned the two new people, please? It would help me to have them at quite a high resolution (at least 300 dpi, and possibly even 600 dpi if possible) - so that I can enlarge them quite a bit for lining up.
Cheers
KJ
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Hi cmitmcm & Kate
Love the new set of photos - there are quite a few similarities between the old gentleman on the left and the young man in the middle.
Definitely with the nose!
You are lucky to have so many photos for reference and they are in very good condition.
Will keep looking in - Su
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Hi,
I've spent some time looking at these photos, and I haven't actually come up with what I was expecting. The older man isn't the young man in the hat - I'm reasonably sure of that, for the following reasons: as men become older their noses and ears become larger - these are the only parts of the face that do continue to grow with old age. Comparing the key points of the young 'hat' man's face, I cannot make them line up with the key points of the old man's face. The nose on the older man is shorter than that on the young man - if it were the other way around I would accept it as general aging, but this doesn't stack up. Also the old man's ears are smaller than those on the young man - once again, quite opposite to what would be expected.
Having said this my son has just suggested that the old man's head is slightly tilted back, which would make his nose look shorter. I still don't think the ears are right.
I still don't think that the new young man is the same as the 'hat' man - for the reason that his eyes are wider, and his eyebrows have a much more 'surprised' look. However, as is shown in the attached photo (probably in the next post), his ear looks much more like that of the 'hat man'.
Sorry, it's hard to be conclusive about these, but, on balance, I think that these photos are of three different men. Others may have a different opinion - let the argument begin.....
Love and kisses
KJ
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More pictures. I've included the 'hat' man's ear, compared to the ear of the young man, as well as a close up of the eyebrows.
I hope that this has been of help.
Cheers
KJ
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Wow KJ
awesome job
back to square one wonder who he is lol
thank you so very much for all the time you have spend on this the lady who sent it lives in south africa it was a postcard photo she sent what was written on the back and it looks like the old mans writting but not sure now
XX
Carol
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Hi cmitmcm & Kate
There you are; me - two guesses and both way off ;D ;D ;D :-\
I bow to the superior technology & intelligence to use it - well done Kate! (A job with the CSI yet!)
Will keep popping in interested to see this develop further
Su
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Just gone back to my human anatomy texts for a brush up, and would hazard the opinion that none of the men are the same person.
I base this on:
The frontal bone of the skull, the bit that forms ones forehead,
The nasal bone, the bridge of the nose
and the zygomatic bone, the top of the cheek to the outer aspect of the eye.
The face we see sits on these bones as a foundation, and although the cartilage of the nose and ear gets bigger the bone structure stays the same once puberty has drawn to a close. This is why forensic scientist can build a face onto a skull, just like a building the foundation suggests element and dictates others.
Of the first two men the hatless man has a more pronounced frontal bone, his eyes are deeper set than those of the younger man.
The zygomatic bone of the hatless man is more pronounced the pad of the upper cheek is higher, even if we consider that the hatless man is older and carrying the extra adipose (fat) that comes with age the hight of the fat pad can only be explained by the bone below it (think how dear old Granny looked with her teeth in and without them).
Others have spoken about the position of the eyes and the bridge of the nose, and I agree with them.
The second set of three photos can be considered in the same way, while there might be a slight resemblance between the hat wearing man and the other younger man to the right the shape of the frontal bone mitigates against it being the same person. All three have different widths to their nasal bones. There is so little shadow in the photo to the man to the man to the right so it is difficult to say with certainty but his face looks very flat and my experience in health care makes me question if there isn't a genetic disorder lurking that the other's are not exhibiting. Others have mentioned the difference in the ear location between the oldest man and the hatted man. The ear is significant which is why some European countries require an ear to be shown in the passport photo one can be identified by it.
Just think, when the government finally insists that we have to have biometric I.D. cards problems like this will be gone as all the distances and ratios of the critical points on our faces will be documented.
Think I'd rather have my problems served up this way.
Happy hunting
Canuc
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Zygomatically speaking - no seriously ;) see where that is coming from Canuc - good analysis!
Do you think then that all these guys were just closely related?
Su
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Related, not sure on that, I'd want to see a few more photos.
The two younger men may possibly be, their general face shape is similar.
The two older men I'm none too sure about, the mandibles (lower jaw, which give the chin its definition) differ from the younger men because they are squarer as opposed to pointed, but the oldest looking man's face is longer.
Happy to stick with not the same person, but wouldn't want to lump them together just yet.
Happy hunting
Canuc
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Absolutely fascinating Canuc.
There is so little shadow in the photo to the man to the man to the right so it is difficult to say with certainty but his face looks very flat and my experience in health care makes me question if there isn't a genetic disorder lurking that the other's are not exhibiting.
This is particularly interesting - any suggestions of what type of genetic disorder this might be?
Obviously, there are genetic disorders which are easily diagnosed by the appearance of the person - the most obvious being Down's Syndrome, although I know that there are others. I was interested to hear of the recent case where a doctor diagnosed Acromegaly (brain tumour) by a handshake. My own son, who has Asperger's Syndrome, has an unusually long forefinger compared to the rest of his hand (all his fingers are also unusually long), and I know that studies have suggested a link between finger length ratio and a number of disorders.
This is an extremely sensitive issue, obviously, when one considers the possible misuse that this kind of thing could be put to. However, diagnosis of an underlying disorder or syndrome could be very helpful. For example, it's is possible that my son's autism might have been diagnosed much earlier (he was 14) if anyone had bothered to look at his hands, which would have meant that the interventions to assist him could have been put into place much earlier, and he and the rest of the family, could have been put through far less stress over the years. Could it mean that we might be able to look at photographs of our ancestors, and while not getting a diagnosis, at least gain some insight into problems that they might have had? I strongly suspect that my grandfather may have been autistic from the reports of his behaviour, which makes me a little more prepared to look on some of his more unreasonable actions with a tolerant eye.
Does anyone have any thoughts on this? Is the whole idea unacceptable?
Regards
KJ
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- any suggestions of what type of genetic disorder this might be?
Sorry, not my area of expertice. If he presented as a patient then I'd make the usual assessments, but be asking myself if there was something more I needed to take into consideration when providing care. Sorry, that sounds rather cruel - one basis ones care on "normality" and adjusts the care to the needs of the patient, so one looks for the manner in which the patient has moved away from "normal" (always bearing in mind their "normal" state may be abnormal compared to the next person). Nursing was not easy, rewarding but never easy.
It could be the photographic process, or the scan resolution and nothing at all to do with his genetics
Canuc
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Canuc
was waiting to hear back from direct descendants of both men
according to them there was no disorder two of them are in the medical field
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Hi I get the impressing people are thinking I am asking if all the men are the same
that is not the case it was the 1st two men
then the next set of photo's was asking if the solider was the same as either of the older men
the 2 older men are brother the younger man not in uniform is one of their sons